Well, that was very enjoyable, I must say. We had 2 lovely xmas days, with a romantic nine-course dinner on the 25th and a very fun ten-course dinner on the 26th with Fedor's mother and her boyfriend. We thoroughly enjoyed their company (which explains why dinner finished at 2.00AM). Edith and Rob stayed for another 2 days and Fedor entertained them during the day by showing them all the sights of Milano. At night, we entertained them together (by playing Trivial Pursuit until 3.00AM or so), while I went to Uni to work. I did that for every post-xmas day so far actually, except today, when I worked at home. The reason for this is that I wanted to finish most of my work before going to the NETHERLANDS tomorrow! I managed for most part, but not completely unfortunately.
Tomorrow, on Bergamo Airport, we will meet with Edith and Rob again, who have spent 2 days in/around Bergamo hiking and we plan to fly back together. At least, we hope so. Apparently this isnt guaranteed quite yet. Supposedly, there is a very bad storm in the Netherlands, which might cause trouble, but additionally, due to foggy conditions in Bergamo, today's flight from Bergamo to Eindhoven was cancelled too. Oh well, I hope we will make, and as a positive person, I have faith we will indeed!!!
Anyways, I want to take the opportunity to wish everyone a very happy end of the year, and let's party like it is 2007!!!
Ciao,
OJ
Saturday, December 30, 2006
Saturday, December 23, 2006
Nearly xmas
I realise it has been a long time since I last posted anything, but I really have been very busy... I have been trying to get some work done, as I am trying to finish a first draft of a paper before mid-January. Sofar, the paper consists of 0 pages, so there is still some work to be done...
However, there are also other things I have indeed been busy with. Marieke and Margo, Fedors friends from Nijmegen, were here to visit last weekend. It was obviously great to see them again after such a long time and we spent some lovely evenings and days together...
Drinking beer at La Fontanella is always one of those fun things to be done with visiting friends, isn't it?
Also, obviously Xmas is coming up, which always involves a lot of time-consuming things. Shopping for presents is one of them, deciding what to eat and doing groceries is another (I have been to 3 different supermarkets for that: terrible...): We will be having 2 very nice xmas dinners on Monday and Tuesday. Monday will be a romantic dinner-for-two while Tuesday will be dinner-for-four with Fedor's Mother and her boyfriend. And of course, as part of the Xmas-thing coming up, I have been going to some xmas-celebrations recently. In fact, a total of 4 Xmas celebrations of some kind. First, there was the xmas-student-representatives dinner early last week, followed by a xmas dinner and going out with one of Fedor's jobs. On Tuesday there was a big Xmas-lunch at Uni hosted by the Institute of Political Economics. Finally, on Thursday, there were Xmas-drinks with the entire PhD in Economics to have the opportunity to wish everyone good holidays. All in all, these were some busy, but pleasant days...
I have also had some really great news! I have now got 2 jobs! One is Research Assistant to one of the new Assistant Professors, for a project on terrorism. Very interesting, actually. And I will be able to earn some cash that way! The other job, which I have just managed to get, is Tutor for an undergraduate course in Comparitive Political Economics. Basically, this can be summarised with GOOD MONEY... The wage rate for tutors is excellent, to put it mildly...
Alright, I think I can now start with starting to cook the first dishes for Xmas.
Merry XMAS everyone!!!
Ciao,
OJ
However, there are also other things I have indeed been busy with. Marieke and Margo, Fedors friends from Nijmegen, were here to visit last weekend. It was obviously great to see them again after such a long time and we spent some lovely evenings and days together...
Drinking beer at La Fontanella is always one of those fun things to be done with visiting friends, isn't it?
Also, obviously Xmas is coming up, which always involves a lot of time-consuming things. Shopping for presents is one of them, deciding what to eat and doing groceries is another (I have been to 3 different supermarkets for that: terrible...): We will be having 2 very nice xmas dinners on Monday and Tuesday. Monday will be a romantic dinner-for-two while Tuesday will be dinner-for-four with Fedor's Mother and her boyfriend. And of course, as part of the Xmas-thing coming up, I have been going to some xmas-celebrations recently. In fact, a total of 4 Xmas celebrations of some kind. First, there was the xmas-student-representatives dinner early last week, followed by a xmas dinner and going out with one of Fedor's jobs. On Tuesday there was a big Xmas-lunch at Uni hosted by the Institute of Political Economics. Finally, on Thursday, there were Xmas-drinks with the entire PhD in Economics to have the opportunity to wish everyone good holidays. All in all, these were some busy, but pleasant days...
I have also had some really great news! I have now got 2 jobs! One is Research Assistant to one of the new Assistant Professors, for a project on terrorism. Very interesting, actually. And I will be able to earn some cash that way! The other job, which I have just managed to get, is Tutor for an undergraduate course in Comparitive Political Economics. Basically, this can be summarised with GOOD MONEY... The wage rate for tutors is excellent, to put it mildly...
Alright, I think I can now start with starting to cook the first dishes for Xmas.
Merry XMAS everyone!!!
Ciao,
OJ
Wednesday, December 13, 2006
Questura, part VI
Last weekend was a lovely long one, with the celebrations for San Ambrogio and the Immaculate Collection by Madonna. I did work on the latter day, but still it felt like a relaxing weekend. Possibly this was because it was a visitor-free weekend during which we had actively planned not to do anything active. We did well...
This week, however, it was full-pull back to work of course. I managed put in quite a few hours of Labour in order to finish some things in time. Finally, today I decided to return to the Questura again for my Permesso di Soggiorno (permission to stay). The office was supposed to open at 15.00, so I made sure I was there at 14.00. Suddenly, at 14.10 the office opened early!!!!!
This was great news, because only few people had arrived yet (about 25, normally there are about 100 people there). And, even more amazing, we were allowed to wait inside, whereas normally you stand the entire afternoon outside at the side entrance (foreigners are not allowed to enter the police station through the front door).
After about an hour it was my turn and.....
...
...
...
...
...
...
I did NOT get a permesso. Another problem, to which the lady behind the desk didnt know the answer. But she was going to contact the Head Office and I should return in January.
WHAT????
The goddamned SIXTH time I went to the fucking Police Station and the sixth time that I was told to return another time. As if I do not have anything else to do!!! At least it only took about an hour this time, so that did give me a little comfort. However, I still think they seriously only do all this to piss me off (which is working rather well...).
I did, however, recently realise how grateful I should be for having a European passport. If I hear all the trouble others have to go through in order to get out of the country to visit family, or go to conferences, or get back into Italy, it makes me very grateful.
But I still HATE THE GODDAMNED QUESTURA!!!!
Ciao,
OJ
This week, however, it was full-pull back to work of course. I managed put in quite a few hours of Labour in order to finish some things in time. Finally, today I decided to return to the Questura again for my Permesso di Soggiorno (permission to stay). The office was supposed to open at 15.00, so I made sure I was there at 14.00. Suddenly, at 14.10 the office opened early!!!!!
This was great news, because only few people had arrived yet (about 25, normally there are about 100 people there). And, even more amazing, we were allowed to wait inside, whereas normally you stand the entire afternoon outside at the side entrance (foreigners are not allowed to enter the police station through the front door).
After about an hour it was my turn and.....
...
...
...
...
...
...
I did NOT get a permesso. Another problem, to which the lady behind the desk didnt know the answer. But she was going to contact the Head Office and I should return in January.
WHAT????
The goddamned SIXTH time I went to the fucking Police Station and the sixth time that I was told to return another time. As if I do not have anything else to do!!! At least it only took about an hour this time, so that did give me a little comfort. However, I still think they seriously only do all this to piss me off (which is working rather well...).
I did, however, recently realise how grateful I should be for having a European passport. If I hear all the trouble others have to go through in order to get out of the country to visit family, or go to conferences, or get back into Italy, it makes me very grateful.
But I still HATE THE GODDAMNED QUESTURA!!!!
Ciao,
OJ
Thursday, December 07, 2006
Cooker
Oh my god, what a disaster it was to get the cooker, as I have hinted before. But we finally managed! To summarise, we had been waiting since August for its arrival. The landlord had been promising to deliver it any time soon during all that time as well, but to no avail.
Last week, we finally made it: the cooker was at the smith and I only had to go and see him. After going there twice, we realised it was not actually that easy. However, thanks to the landlord, the smith arrived Friday (2 hours late, but still). He then realised something was wrong and returned to his shop and came back again later. Quite a hassle it was. Especially because there was still something wrong... On Monday, he was due to come again, but did not show up. The next day, I received an accusing message from the landlord that we had not been at home. Strange... At night we checked whether the doorbell was actually working properly, to make sure we would not miss him again. But even though it did work, there was no smith. Another accusing message from the landlord incited me to go to the smith directly... (it was 21.30 by this time).
Once again, he was not there. However, when I was about to enter our building, I saw the smith cycling past. So I ran after him like a little girl and caught him. He then came into the house to make the final installation. Or so we thought...
This time he managed to make it work. But not completely well, so he had to return the next evening again. All this was starting to piss me off by now, because I had to come home early from Uni every day... Yesterday he arrived again and went on to install everything properly. Unfortunately, he did this so rigorously that he actually broke the tubes... His suggestion was to return the next day and finish the work, but I did not think that would be such a good idea, so he returned the same nite and used a lot of aggresive equipment to repair the entire system. And finally, after 4 months of waiting and after 6 visits of the smith (thank god, I am not paying him), we finally have a GAS COOKER!!!! No more cooking on electricity!!!!
Anyways, I was very happy about this and I wanted to wish everybody a happy San Ambrogio (the Saint who protects Milano)... Down here are some more photos of last weekend. Mostly made by Jorryt...
Ciao,
OJ
Last week, we finally made it: the cooker was at the smith and I only had to go and see him. After going there twice, we realised it was not actually that easy. However, thanks to the landlord, the smith arrived Friday (2 hours late, but still). He then realised something was wrong and returned to his shop and came back again later. Quite a hassle it was. Especially because there was still something wrong... On Monday, he was due to come again, but did not show up. The next day, I received an accusing message from the landlord that we had not been at home. Strange... At night we checked whether the doorbell was actually working properly, to make sure we would not miss him again. But even though it did work, there was no smith. Another accusing message from the landlord incited me to go to the smith directly... (it was 21.30 by this time).
Once again, he was not there. However, when I was about to enter our building, I saw the smith cycling past. So I ran after him like a little girl and caught him. He then came into the house to make the final installation. Or so we thought...
This time he managed to make it work. But not completely well, so he had to return the next evening again. All this was starting to piss me off by now, because I had to come home early from Uni every day... Yesterday he arrived again and went on to install everything properly. Unfortunately, he did this so rigorously that he actually broke the tubes... His suggestion was to return the next day and finish the work, but I did not think that would be such a good idea, so he returned the same nite and used a lot of aggresive equipment to repair the entire system. And finally, after 4 months of waiting and after 6 visits of the smith (thank god, I am not paying him), we finally have a GAS COOKER!!!! No more cooking on electricity!!!!
Anyways, I was very happy about this and I wanted to wish everybody a happy San Ambrogio (the Saint who protects Milano)... Down here are some more photos of last weekend. Mostly made by Jorryt...
Ciao,
OJ
Monday, December 04, 2006
Goodbye Jorryt & Lilian
Thursday afternoon, Jorryt and Lilian arrived. They were lucky to finally make it to Italy because a dense fog around the Netherlands had diverted many planes. But finally, with a little bit of a delay, they did make it to Milan.
After showing the house and a little walk, we went for an Aperitivo in a bar nearby.
The next morning, I made another attempt at getting a real cooker. We have been using a bloody electric cooker for 4 months now and the landlord continually promises that the gas-cooker will be installed "next week". Yet anoter attempt, this time at the local smith was unsuccessful. After this little struggle, I took Jorryt and Lilian to University where we had lunch. Afterwards, they went to visit the Duomo and the city center, where Jorryt shot some gorgeous photos (which I might post some other day...). At night, while waiting for the smith to arrive, as he finally did promise to come, we had some little drinks and considered whether to go out or not. There were a few party offers, but the public transport strike made it impossible to go anywhere. Additionally, the smith didnt arrive until 21.30 (approximately 18.00, right?). Of course, there was a piece missing, so we still do NOT have a normal cooker...
Finally a nice pizza was all we had that night. Probably that was a good idea, as we were going on a trip for the weekend. We got up early and went to Central Station to pick up our rental car. A lovely Fiat Punto that served us very well for the weekend... Thank god Jorryt didnt mind driving, because I really dont like doing it! I am much better at navigating, anyway. I managed to get us to Pisa, where we visited another thing on The List: the Leaning Tower!
After a lovely stroll through Pisa, which is actually an enjoyable town, we drove to Lucca, a famous and gorgeous old city. Unfortunately, it was already dark before we got there, so there are little photos available of the lovely old town centre.
That night, we made a bit of a night of it. Drank quite a few drinks and had some reasonable food. It was a very enjoyable affair, all in all. We were staying in a very nice guesthouse, just outside the old city centre, where we had a gorgeous veranda to sit on at night, enjoying our nightcap before going to bed...
Sunday, we were going to go to Cinque Terre. Unfortunately the weather looked quite horrific. A drizzly rain, very grey and miserable. However, we did not let that stop us and drove to Cinque Terre anyway.
Driving through the last tunnel was quite amazing, as it suddenly cleared up completely when arriving at the coastal side of the mountains. So we actually had a beautiful day in the Cinque Terre, with 20-something degrees and nicely sunny most of the time... We managed to do 3 of the 5 Terre during this day and Jorryt did a very good job in navigating us down the slopes of the Ligurian coast (once again, I was very happy not to be the one driving!!!)
After enjoying these stunning villages (probably I will post more photos in the future. I just cannot really be bothered right now), we drove back to Milan, where we arrived at about 19.30. 650 kilometers and a lot of fun!!!
This morning, it was an early wake-up call, because I joined Jorryt and Lilian to drive to Central Station, where I returned the car to the rental company. Honestly, I was quite relieved to be rid of it, because it is quite a responsibility...
After saying goodbye to Jorryt and Lilian, I returned to University to be busy there with many things (I have a temporary job as a Research Assistant!!! Just a few hours of preparatory work for a project to see if it is feasible. But it means income, so that is always great!). Unfortunately, I could not stay late because the darn smith was supposed to return tonite (somewhere around 18.00), but he has not. So still no cooker......... :-((((
Ciao,
OJ
After showing the house and a little walk, we went for an Aperitivo in a bar nearby.
The next morning, I made another attempt at getting a real cooker. We have been using a bloody electric cooker for 4 months now and the landlord continually promises that the gas-cooker will be installed "next week". Yet anoter attempt, this time at the local smith was unsuccessful. After this little struggle, I took Jorryt and Lilian to University where we had lunch. Afterwards, they went to visit the Duomo and the city center, where Jorryt shot some gorgeous photos (which I might post some other day...). At night, while waiting for the smith to arrive, as he finally did promise to come, we had some little drinks and considered whether to go out or not. There were a few party offers, but the public transport strike made it impossible to go anywhere. Additionally, the smith didnt arrive until 21.30 (approximately 18.00, right?). Of course, there was a piece missing, so we still do NOT have a normal cooker...
Finally a nice pizza was all we had that night. Probably that was a good idea, as we were going on a trip for the weekend. We got up early and went to Central Station to pick up our rental car. A lovely Fiat Punto that served us very well for the weekend... Thank god Jorryt didnt mind driving, because I really dont like doing it! I am much better at navigating, anyway. I managed to get us to Pisa, where we visited another thing on The List: the Leaning Tower!
After a lovely stroll through Pisa, which is actually an enjoyable town, we drove to Lucca, a famous and gorgeous old city. Unfortunately, it was already dark before we got there, so there are little photos available of the lovely old town centre.
That night, we made a bit of a night of it. Drank quite a few drinks and had some reasonable food. It was a very enjoyable affair, all in all. We were staying in a very nice guesthouse, just outside the old city centre, where we had a gorgeous veranda to sit on at night, enjoying our nightcap before going to bed...
Sunday, we were going to go to Cinque Terre. Unfortunately the weather looked quite horrific. A drizzly rain, very grey and miserable. However, we did not let that stop us and drove to Cinque Terre anyway.
Driving through the last tunnel was quite amazing, as it suddenly cleared up completely when arriving at the coastal side of the mountains. So we actually had a beautiful day in the Cinque Terre, with 20-something degrees and nicely sunny most of the time... We managed to do 3 of the 5 Terre during this day and Jorryt did a very good job in navigating us down the slopes of the Ligurian coast (once again, I was very happy not to be the one driving!!!)
After enjoying these stunning villages (probably I will post more photos in the future. I just cannot really be bothered right now), we drove back to Milan, where we arrived at about 19.30. 650 kilometers and a lot of fun!!!
This morning, it was an early wake-up call, because I joined Jorryt and Lilian to drive to Central Station, where I returned the car to the rental company. Honestly, I was quite relieved to be rid of it, because it is quite a responsibility...
After saying goodbye to Jorryt and Lilian, I returned to University to be busy there with many things (I have a temporary job as a Research Assistant!!! Just a few hours of preparatory work for a project to see if it is feasible. But it means income, so that is always great!). Unfortunately, I could not stay late because the darn smith was supposed to return tonite (somewhere around 18.00), but he has not. So still no cooker......... :-((((
Ciao,
OJ
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