So, the holidays have started. Of course, just my luck, I have been sick for about a week now. However, I feel I am recovering now, and I am ready to start cooking. Actually, I have already started cooking this weekend, but the majority of it will take place tomorrow (and the day after). My 10-course meal is looking to be absolutely lovely, I truly believe. I even managed to get fresh tuna this year, in order to make my tuna carpaccio! So that should certainly delight Jorryt and Lilian, who will be arriving in an hour or so.
And of course christmas is also about unwrapping presents, because our tree is absolutely covered in presents, right now, so there will be quite a bit of that to do as well!
Unfortunately, we're not having a white xmas :-( Unless foggy white also counts, because it's been quasi-foggy all day long today... Anyways, to compensate for the lack of snow, we'll go to towards the Alps on Thursday, using the car we're renting for that day. So, that'll be a lot of fun too!
Anyways, all I wanted to do right now is wish everyone happy holidays!!!
Ciao,
OJ
Monday, December 24, 2007
Tuesday, December 18, 2007
Too much to discuss.
Well, actually, now that I am thinking about it, there's really not that much to discuss... Lots of work, a few nice evenings here and there, the works. We had friends of Fedor over for the weekend, who kept us rather busy, and we said goodbye to our friends Nina and Antonio who are moving to the Netherlands.
More specifically, I am happy to report that it's nearly christmas! And that means several things. First of all, the courses I am teaching have nearly finished, so that creates a lot of extra time in my schedule. This whole teaching business may be ridiculously overpaid, but it certainly does take up a lot of time. And it's so frustrating when students simply refuse to participate properly (they had complained after the midterm that the classes weren't interactive enough. I try and make them more interactive, but they just refuse to cooperate with me...). But it's good to know that that is nearly over... The second thing I love about xmas is all the functions that are organised. Although I must honestly say that this year there are not a lot of them. Even Fedor's job is not organising a xmas party this year :-(. But at least on Monday, there was a nice lunch of the department of Economics. Tomorrow is the xmas dinner for student representatives (but I'm not going to go) and Thursday afternoon is another session with just the PhD. So, it's not a terribly bad score, but I have had better years! The final thing that is so great about xmas here is the decorations! Milano has really expanded its decorations budget this year, that's for sure, because the city is simply gorgeous! Piazza Duomo is stunning, and I have shown photos of the Castello before: nice, wasn't it?
But, one thing is has been very disappointing: no Swarovski-decorated xmas tree in the middle of the Galleria this year. I was very sad when I found out the Swarovski tree had been dumped...
Finally, the flu has been going around and it has entered our home. Not good... (I say while blowing my nose and coughing my lungs out)
Ciao,
OJ
Well, actually, now that I am thinking about it, there's really not that much to discuss... Lots of work, a few nice evenings here and there, the works. We had friends of Fedor over for the weekend, who kept us rather busy, and we said goodbye to our friends Nina and Antonio who are moving to the Netherlands.
More specifically, I am happy to report that it's nearly christmas! And that means several things. First of all, the courses I am teaching have nearly finished, so that creates a lot of extra time in my schedule. This whole teaching business may be ridiculously overpaid, but it certainly does take up a lot of time. And it's so frustrating when students simply refuse to participate properly (they had complained after the midterm that the classes weren't interactive enough. I try and make them more interactive, but they just refuse to cooperate with me...). But it's good to know that that is nearly over... The second thing I love about xmas is all the functions that are organised. Although I must honestly say that this year there are not a lot of them. Even Fedor's job is not organising a xmas party this year :-(. But at least on Monday, there was a nice lunch of the department of Economics. Tomorrow is the xmas dinner for student representatives (but I'm not going to go) and Thursday afternoon is another session with just the PhD. So, it's not a terribly bad score, but I have had better years! The final thing that is so great about xmas here is the decorations! Milano has really expanded its decorations budget this year, that's for sure, because the city is simply gorgeous! Piazza Duomo is stunning, and I have shown photos of the Castello before: nice, wasn't it?
But, one thing is has been very disappointing: no Swarovski-decorated xmas tree in the middle of the Galleria this year. I was very sad when I found out the Swarovski tree had been dumped...
Finally, the flu has been going around and it has entered our home. Not good... (I say while blowing my nose and coughing my lungs out)
Ciao,
OJ
Sunday, December 09, 2007
Happy Sant'Ambrogio everyone!
Ho, ho, ho, it's nearly christmas! Well, maybe that's not entirely true, but we're totally getting into the xmas mood! It helped that this Friday was Sant'Ambrogio, the patron saint of Milano, so Fedor and I were both free from work (well, Fedor was free and at University, they just lock the building so it's actually impossible to work, but that's just a detail). Instead, we started on our xmas shopping! And there are so many things to buy in this city, it's very exciting to go shopping!!! Particularly because I made 200€ last Wednesday by recording the slogan for a radio-advertisement in a few European countries (I did the Dutch, German and English slogans), so I actually had money to spend on shopping!
And the city is becoming so beautiful with all lights and decorations throughout, it's enchanting! A final thing that really adds to the athmosphere are a number of markets that open around this time. The official christmas market, I haven't actually been to, but I know from other years it's really lovely. The Sant'Ambrogio market named O Bei, O Bei, however, was as lovely as always. An enormous market with lots of christmas goodies, and food and mulled wine (gluhwein). I love going there...
A separate market that started in December 1 and ended today is the Fiera Artigianale in the local convention centre. It's an ENORMOUS fair with handmade goodies and lots of food from all Italian regions, as well as many other countries of the world. It's absolutely gigantic and we went today with friends, but there was simply too much to see (and taste).
Of course we have also had a few social activities during these days, going to (finally) see the new, uhm, well, house is not appropriate, neither is appartment, but room sounds too aweful. Let's say we went to see the new "domicile" of our friends Felix and Annaig. It's, well, small. But the building is gorgeous and their kitchen is 3 times as big as ours. And they made good use of it, cooking us a grand meal on Friday. Yesterday we went out for aperitivo because Nissrine was in Milan for the weekend. She was very sad, because of all the trouble with her permesso. She actually has to go back to Canada for a few months, even though she has a job and the company is willing to do everything for her. But the bastards at the police station refuse to give her a residence permit. It's sad.
Anyways, the shopping weekend is nearly over and it's back to business on Monday.
Ciao,
OJ
And the city is becoming so beautiful with all lights and decorations throughout, it's enchanting! A final thing that really adds to the athmosphere are a number of markets that open around this time. The official christmas market, I haven't actually been to, but I know from other years it's really lovely. The Sant'Ambrogio market named O Bei, O Bei, however, was as lovely as always. An enormous market with lots of christmas goodies, and food and mulled wine (gluhwein). I love going there...
A separate market that started in December 1 and ended today is the Fiera Artigianale in the local convention centre. It's an ENORMOUS fair with handmade goodies and lots of food from all Italian regions, as well as many other countries of the world. It's absolutely gigantic and we went today with friends, but there was simply too much to see (and taste).
Of course we have also had a few social activities during these days, going to (finally) see the new, uhm, well, house is not appropriate, neither is appartment, but room sounds too aweful. Let's say we went to see the new "domicile" of our friends Felix and Annaig. It's, well, small. But the building is gorgeous and their kitchen is 3 times as big as ours. And they made good use of it, cooking us a grand meal on Friday. Yesterday we went out for aperitivo because Nissrine was in Milan for the weekend. She was very sad, because of all the trouble with her permesso. She actually has to go back to Canada for a few months, even though she has a job and the company is willing to do everything for her. But the bastards at the police station refuse to give her a residence permit. It's sad.
Anyways, the shopping weekend is nearly over and it's back to business on Monday.
Ciao,
OJ
Sunday, December 02, 2007
Where to start
You know how it works: You don't do something for a while and then you realise you really should. But when you don't have time, you jut postpone it again thinking "oh well, it's been a while, so it doesn't really matter if it takes some more time". But then, at one point, you come to the stage that it has been so long that it is too much of a hassle to do it anyway. That's where my blogging is at right now. So I will give just a short overview of the past period and promise a better life in the future.
Up to a degree, I blame Fedor, because he had destroyed his computer and we therefore had only one computer to work with. And because I am rarely home while he isnt, this meant that I basically had very little time to work on the computer without him sitting next to me, waiting for us to be able to watch a movie or something. however, thanks to Jorryt's Magic Touch, Fedor's computer now kinda works again, so I can now finally update my blog.
So, over the past weeks, lots has happened. Work, work, work, what can I say... Progress is being made, but I'll let you know when there is something more definitive.
Socially, of course there are more interesting things to discuss. Like the birthday party of my friend Idil, who celebrated in a church-turned-bar, which looked fantastic!!!
It was the same weekend that Fedor's friend Wouter was visiting, and we had a really good time with him and with all our other friends. The weekend after, Fedor went to see friends in Belgium and I went to the Netherlands to see my new-born niece. And of course, the rest of the family. I had a really good time seeing everyone (and Jorryt was able to repair Fedor's computer, so that was good new as well). Unfortunately, while my sisters-in-law took about a billion gazillion photos, I have only receive 1 so far and I am waiting for others to be able to weigh my options which one I want to put down here.... So that is for the future.
The next party was last Friday, my friend Andreja's bday. No photos for that just yet, but I am sure they will also come in the future...
This weekend, Fedor and I went to the town of Reggio Emilia, where our friend Nissrine moved to. It's a town in Emilia Romagna that is simply gorgeous. Gorgeous, but very quiet as well. So Nissrine does not have a lot to do and she was very excited to see us... She showed us the entire town and we had a lot of fun. Nice dinner, a lovely bottle of wine in a deserted wine bar, et cetera. It was good.
Today, we rturned to clean the house, do laundry and get ready for another working week. A short one, because Friday is Sant'Ambrogio's holiday, followed by the Immacolata, so that means celebrations and free days! And of course, Xmas is coming up. We're listing to xmas music, we put up the xmas tree (photos will be shown in the future) and we're very holiday spirited...
Ho ho ho!
Ciao,
OJ
Up to a degree, I blame Fedor, because he had destroyed his computer and we therefore had only one computer to work with. And because I am rarely home while he isnt, this meant that I basically had very little time to work on the computer without him sitting next to me, waiting for us to be able to watch a movie or something. however, thanks to Jorryt's Magic Touch, Fedor's computer now kinda works again, so I can now finally update my blog.
So, over the past weeks, lots has happened. Work, work, work, what can I say... Progress is being made, but I'll let you know when there is something more definitive.
Socially, of course there are more interesting things to discuss. Like the birthday party of my friend Idil, who celebrated in a church-turned-bar, which looked fantastic!!!
It was the same weekend that Fedor's friend Wouter was visiting, and we had a really good time with him and with all our other friends. The weekend after, Fedor went to see friends in Belgium and I went to the Netherlands to see my new-born niece. And of course, the rest of the family. I had a really good time seeing everyone (and Jorryt was able to repair Fedor's computer, so that was good new as well). Unfortunately, while my sisters-in-law took about a billion gazillion photos, I have only receive 1 so far and I am waiting for others to be able to weigh my options which one I want to put down here.... So that is for the future.
The next party was last Friday, my friend Andreja's bday. No photos for that just yet, but I am sure they will also come in the future...
This weekend, Fedor and I went to the town of Reggio Emilia, where our friend Nissrine moved to. It's a town in Emilia Romagna that is simply gorgeous. Gorgeous, but very quiet as well. So Nissrine does not have a lot to do and she was very excited to see us... She showed us the entire town and we had a lot of fun. Nice dinner, a lovely bottle of wine in a deserted wine bar, et cetera. It was good.
Today, we rturned to clean the house, do laundry and get ready for another working week. A short one, because Friday is Sant'Ambrogio's holiday, followed by the Immacolata, so that means celebrations and free days! And of course, Xmas is coming up. We're listing to xmas music, we put up the xmas tree (photos will be shown in the future) and we're very holiday spirited...
Ho ho ho!
Ciao,
OJ
Tuesday, November 13, 2007
Still Fedor's Birthday
It's amazing, his birthday seems to be unending! Not only is he still receiving presents (although we know there is still stuff lost in the mail. At least the drawings of my niece have arrived today). But more importantly, we also finally had his birthday party last Saturday. About 35-40 people in our tiny flat, for dinner... And it was a lot of fun!!!
I did spend about 2 days in the kitchen, making lasagnas, quiches, pies, pasta salads, rice salad, potatoe salad (huzarensalade, actually! Very nice...), et cetera. But it was totally worth it, because everybody seemed to appreciate it a lot. Particularly my real Dutch FE-DOR Apple pies were highly appreciated:
And nearly everyone kept with the theme of the evening: Prosecco Party! So there was lots and lots of Prosecco to go around (and actually, there was lots left as well). The next afternoon, after having finished cleaning, the glass disposal looked as if it was January 1st!
But I also had fun letting people try out some of the liquors I made. As expected, there was little praise for Rucolacello (probably because it's kinda gross), but the limoncello and arancello was liked...
All in all, I can say that I had an absolutely great time, but it is too much hassle to do on a regular basis... Maybe next year again.
Finally, great news from Holland. My Sis-in-Law gave birth to a beautiful baby girl. Meet Hannah:
Isn't that lovely, with Leah sweetly caring for Hannah? I am very excited about seeing them all next week, when I go to see the family...
In other news: Fedor broke his computer. Stupido.
Ciao,
OJ
I did spend about 2 days in the kitchen, making lasagnas, quiches, pies, pasta salads, rice salad, potatoe salad (huzarensalade, actually! Very nice...), et cetera. But it was totally worth it, because everybody seemed to appreciate it a lot. Particularly my real Dutch FE-DOR Apple pies were highly appreciated:
And nearly everyone kept with the theme of the evening: Prosecco Party! So there was lots and lots of Prosecco to go around (and actually, there was lots left as well). The next afternoon, after having finished cleaning, the glass disposal looked as if it was January 1st!
But I also had fun letting people try out some of the liquors I made. As expected, there was little praise for Rucolacello (probably because it's kinda gross), but the limoncello and arancello was liked...
All in all, I can say that I had an absolutely great time, but it is too much hassle to do on a regular basis... Maybe next year again.
Finally, great news from Holland. My Sis-in-Law gave birth to a beautiful baby girl. Meet Hannah:
Isn't that lovely, with Leah sweetly caring for Hannah? I am very excited about seeing them all next week, when I go to see the family...
In other news: Fedor broke his computer. Stupido.
Ciao,
OJ
Tuesday, November 06, 2007
Halloween: the photos
And finally a photo from last Summer, when we went to Ternate with Enrico and Belinda. I know it looks like a scene from La Dolce Vita or something, but it's Belinda and me swinging on a local village dance...........
Ciao,
OJ
Saturday, November 03, 2007
Halloween etc
What can I say: that was quite a party!!! We went to Caroline's house (Fedor's boss) for our Halloween party and it was great. Of course we had been debating for ages about how to dress, but finally we went our seperate ways and just did what we were best at: Fedor dressed as a 1970s porn star and I dressed as a corpse (well, that is: Dr Black, the Cluedo main character who gets murdered in that game). I wore black clothes and with the help of some fake scars and blood, looked as if someone spent quite some time clubbing my head in with a candle holder! Probably not Ms Scarlett, because there was too much blood for that: I suspect Reverend Green, but I think we'll never know...
Among the other guests at the party, there were at least 10 witches (they may be able to start their own football team!), Wonder Woman, Batwoman, a slug, a schoolboy and most impressively: the Hulk... Now this would obviously be an appropriate moment for photos, but unfortunately Picasa has decided that it doesn't want me to upload any photos right now. However, I can give you a link to my Facebook photo album instead, which is HERE.
The party was so much fun that we actually made stayed until we could get a morning tram home. So we saved money on a cab! Of course this did mean a long sleep-in on Thursday, but since this was a holiday anyway, it wasnt really a problem.
The bigger problem was the fact that because of this bloody holiday (All Saints), the University was closed from Thursday until Sunday, so I had to find another location to do my grading. I had to grade lots and lots of Macroeconomics exams and I have now finally decided that I really do not like to grade.... Anyway, today (Saturday) I finally finished that stuff. The rest of the weekend is quiet for us, no visitors and nothing else planned (Except for going to have dinner at a friend's place tomorrow), so I am happy.
Ciao,
OJ
Among the other guests at the party, there were at least 10 witches (they may be able to start their own football team!), Wonder Woman, Batwoman, a slug, a schoolboy and most impressively: the Hulk... Now this would obviously be an appropriate moment for photos, but unfortunately Picasa has decided that it doesn't want me to upload any photos right now. However, I can give you a link to my Facebook photo album instead, which is HERE.
The party was so much fun that we actually made stayed until we could get a morning tram home. So we saved money on a cab! Of course this did mean a long sleep-in on Thursday, but since this was a holiday anyway, it wasnt really a problem.
The bigger problem was the fact that because of this bloody holiday (All Saints), the University was closed from Thursday until Sunday, so I had to find another location to do my grading. I had to grade lots and lots of Macroeconomics exams and I have now finally decided that I really do not like to grade.... Anyway, today (Saturday) I finally finished that stuff. The rest of the weekend is quiet for us, no visitors and nothing else planned (Except for going to have dinner at a friend's place tomorrow), so I am happy.
Ciao,
OJ
Tuesday, October 30, 2007
Happy Bday, darling
My trip to Holland was not overly successfull. Unfortunately, my sister-in-law didn't manage to give birth in time for me to be able to go and see the newest member of the family, so that was quite disappointing. Instead, I went to see my parents, which was enjoyable too, but seeing the baby would have been better, of course!
Thursday night, I went to see my friends Andrea's house and I stayed overnight in a hotel in Amsterdam. I got "upgraded" to another hotel, but it was still pretty crappy... Why pay 135€ for 2 nights in a hotel that smells completely of hasj, doesn't have an elevator (5th floor), has tiny, tiny, tiny rooms and crappy TV reception? I mean, for that price you can stay 3 nights in a 4-star hotel in Milano!
Anyway, I got up early next day to go to Utrecht, where the conference was taking place. It was good to see some of the people that I haven't spoken to for years (from my old University, mostly). Unfortunately, my presentation wasn't the greatest success: there were some very critical voices who did not like what I did at all! Oh well, at least I got some useful comments and I have some more work to do now...
In the evening I went out with my friend Esther in Amsterdam and actually got a little bit drunk (well, I realised the next day, when I was slightly hung-over... This may also be related to the lack of sleep, however). Saturday, I spent all day travelling to get back to Milano, where Fedor's family was visiting in honour of his birthday. At night we went to an all-inclusive restaurant, where we collectively drank way too much. At home we continued drinking for some more time, but I couldnt tell you what time we finished drinking: it was a lot of fun though... And I think Fedor really enjoyed it, as well...
After a hung-over Sunday, the real world started again on Monday. And it turns out I have somehow been upgraded to sole-responsible for a particular group of students of Macroeconomics (last year's resitters), as well as assisting the professor for the group that I am actually responsible for, so there is a lot of grading to do!!! Slightly inconvenient that answering models for the exams are only available in Italian, but at least I am getting some practice!
Finally, of course we are preparing for Halloween tomorrow! We're going to go to a Halloween party at Caroline's house (Fedor's boss) and I can't wait!!! I will try to remember to bring my camera, so you can enjoy the photos at my next post...
Ciao,
OJ
Thursday night, I went to see my friends Andrea's house and I stayed overnight in a hotel in Amsterdam. I got "upgraded" to another hotel, but it was still pretty crappy... Why pay 135€ for 2 nights in a hotel that smells completely of hasj, doesn't have an elevator (5th floor), has tiny, tiny, tiny rooms and crappy TV reception? I mean, for that price you can stay 3 nights in a 4-star hotel in Milano!
Anyway, I got up early next day to go to Utrecht, where the conference was taking place. It was good to see some of the people that I haven't spoken to for years (from my old University, mostly). Unfortunately, my presentation wasn't the greatest success: there were some very critical voices who did not like what I did at all! Oh well, at least I got some useful comments and I have some more work to do now...
In the evening I went out with my friend Esther in Amsterdam and actually got a little bit drunk (well, I realised the next day, when I was slightly hung-over... This may also be related to the lack of sleep, however). Saturday, I spent all day travelling to get back to Milano, where Fedor's family was visiting in honour of his birthday. At night we went to an all-inclusive restaurant, where we collectively drank way too much. At home we continued drinking for some more time, but I couldnt tell you what time we finished drinking: it was a lot of fun though... And I think Fedor really enjoyed it, as well...
After a hung-over Sunday, the real world started again on Monday. And it turns out I have somehow been upgraded to sole-responsible for a particular group of students of Macroeconomics (last year's resitters), as well as assisting the professor for the group that I am actually responsible for, so there is a lot of grading to do!!! Slightly inconvenient that answering models for the exams are only available in Italian, but at least I am getting some practice!
Finally, of course we are preparing for Halloween tomorrow! We're going to go to a Halloween party at Caroline's house (Fedor's boss) and I can't wait!!! I will try to remember to bring my camera, so you can enjoy the photos at my next post...
Ciao,
OJ
Wednesday, October 24, 2007
Next up: Holland
As you can guess, the past time has been crazy busy. The midterms for the macro-courses that I am teaching are coming up very soon, so the students are getting nervous and the amount of time consumed by that increases significantly! In addition to that, I wanted to finish some additional work on my paper before going to Holland to present it. The bad news is: I didn't actually finish the things I wanted to finish. The good news, however: I have had a new idea for a paper and it seems like something that could really be worthwhile! And by worthwhile, I mean relevant, new and relatively easy to do. So I am completely excited about this, and my supervisor was reasonably positive too today: woohoo!
On Thursday, I will fly to Holland (assuming the planned strike at Lombardic airports is going to be cancelled) and I will spend that day either visiting my brother's new child (if (s)he manages to be born in time), or visiting my parents. At night, I am staying in Amsterdam and on Friday there will be the NAKE Research Day in Utrecht, where I am going to present my paper (for the fifth time: I am starting to get mildly sick of it now). Then, after another night in Amsterdam, I will fly back to Milano on Saturday morning. Busy, busy, busy, because we're going to have Fedor's family visiting for his birthday...
On the subject of visitors, we had our first visitors in months last weekend, when Femke and Ruud came over for a few days. It was very enjoyable and it was nice to have them...
Finally, I should add the invite we've been sending around for our Prosecco Party, to celebrate Fedor's 26th birthday which is coming up. I think the invitation looks kinda cool, but of course I have to give credit where credit's due and I therefore thank Jorryt for the background photo that he took (and he doesnt know I'm using it).
Ciao,
OJ
On Thursday, I will fly to Holland (assuming the planned strike at Lombardic airports is going to be cancelled) and I will spend that day either visiting my brother's new child (if (s)he manages to be born in time), or visiting my parents. At night, I am staying in Amsterdam and on Friday there will be the NAKE Research Day in Utrecht, where I am going to present my paper (for the fifth time: I am starting to get mildly sick of it now). Then, after another night in Amsterdam, I will fly back to Milano on Saturday morning. Busy, busy, busy, because we're going to have Fedor's family visiting for his birthday...
On the subject of visitors, we had our first visitors in months last weekend, when Femke and Ruud came over for a few days. It was very enjoyable and it was nice to have them...
Finally, I should add the invite we've been sending around for our Prosecco Party, to celebrate Fedor's 26th birthday which is coming up. I think the invitation looks kinda cool, but of course I have to give credit where credit's due and I therefore thank Jorryt for the background photo that he took (and he doesnt know I'm using it).
Ciao,
OJ
Sunday, October 14, 2007
good times
Wow, I can't believe how long it has been since my last post. It really is just the case that there's a lot going on and I don't find the time to post anything. As I mentioned, last weekend we were in Duesseldorf visiting my friend Stephie, It was great to see her and she showed us her lovely city. And a lovely city, it is! It really is amazingly beautiful, with gorgeous architecture and very friendly people. Apparently, Duesseldorf is actually one of the wealthiest cities in Germany and with the wealthiest inhabitants as well, which explains a lot! Our visit was extremely short, but it was certainly worth it, because it was great!
Just some photos:
For more photos, go
HERE
After returning from Duesseldorf, I went to see the new exhibition in Via Dante (where there is a photo exhibition every winter), this time with National Geographic-photographers around the theme EQUILIBRIUM. I went mainly to check out the great photography, but also to take some pictures so I could write something about the exhibition on Volkskrant Reizen, for whom I write as a Travel Correspondent nowadays (in Dutch, though).
The rest of the week was lots of classes and office hours (I still hate teaching, but at least the classes are going a bit better now than my first one....). And of course, working on my research. I have had a great idea for an extension of my first paper, so I am working on that right now. I also received confirmation that I am welcome to present my paper at the NAKE Research Day in Utrecht in 2 weeks. So that means I can go to Holland for a short time (hopefully in time for my sister-in-law to have her baby........). It will be a very short time, though, because we're also having visitors around that time and it will be Fedor's birthday. So in the end, I will go from Thursday morning until Saturday Morning, but it will be nice, I'm sure. I have already booked a hotel (in Amsterdam, because Utrecht is way to expensive) and I am looking forward to it!
Finally, this weekend we had for ourselves. Well, not completely, because we invited Nina and Antonio for dinner yesterday. So I spent all day cooking and we ended up with a lovely Japanese meal. It was a great success and I think everyone enjoyed it. I tried out something new, buying a big piece of swordfish, which was an interesting addition to the standard tuna and salmon I alwasy use.
Of course we finished the meal with home-made limoncello, which I make occassionally. It was a lot of fun (and I am the only one not hung-over today, so that's good too!).
This week: lots of work!
ciao,
OJ
Just some photos:
For more photos, go
HERE
After returning from Duesseldorf, I went to see the new exhibition in Via Dante (where there is a photo exhibition every winter), this time with National Geographic-photographers around the theme EQUILIBRIUM. I went mainly to check out the great photography, but also to take some pictures so I could write something about the exhibition on Volkskrant Reizen, for whom I write as a Travel Correspondent nowadays (in Dutch, though).
The rest of the week was lots of classes and office hours (I still hate teaching, but at least the classes are going a bit better now than my first one....). And of course, working on my research. I have had a great idea for an extension of my first paper, so I am working on that right now. I also received confirmation that I am welcome to present my paper at the NAKE Research Day in Utrecht in 2 weeks. So that means I can go to Holland for a short time (hopefully in time for my sister-in-law to have her baby........). It will be a very short time, though, because we're also having visitors around that time and it will be Fedor's birthday. So in the end, I will go from Thursday morning until Saturday Morning, but it will be nice, I'm sure. I have already booked a hotel (in Amsterdam, because Utrecht is way to expensive) and I am looking forward to it!
Finally, this weekend we had for ourselves. Well, not completely, because we invited Nina and Antonio for dinner yesterday. So I spent all day cooking and we ended up with a lovely Japanese meal. It was a great success and I think everyone enjoyed it. I tried out something new, buying a big piece of swordfish, which was an interesting addition to the standard tuna and salmon I alwasy use.
Of course we finished the meal with home-made limoncello, which I make occassionally. It was a lot of fun (and I am the only one not hung-over today, so that's good too!).
This week: lots of work!
ciao,
OJ
Saturday, October 06, 2007
Paris etc.
I can't believe it's already a week ago that we were in Paris and I haven't written anything about it yet... That's pretty bad! But my excuse is that it was a very busy week. One of these typical Italian weeks: my "everything has been taken care off" job is suddenly not quite as taken care of as it was supposed to be... Of course, we don't hear anything about it directly, but only little snippets of gossip that we can dilute from secretaries et cetera. Apparently, the Powers That Be are currently in the process of deciding whether or not to cut the hours of all the tutors. For the current courses!!! How on earth is it possible to cut the hours of courses that have already started and for which work is already being done, you ask? I have no idea, but I am not impressed. My friend Idil and I have been trying to work out a system in which we both work our maximum number of hours, but now it may turn out that we're gonna be stuck with fewer hours than expected. It really sucks!!!
So all that, and all the involved information-finding missions, have made it a bit of a stressfull week.
But, indeed, last weekend we were in Paris. And it was lovely!!! The Versailles Castle was great, and we spent nearly an entire day in the gardens and the castle (which was necessary to get good-value-for-money, because damn, it's expensive to get in there!!!)
However, most importantly, this was another point from The List (number 41, that is), so half of the Paris-mission was accomplished.
We then went on to see a lot of other famous sites, like the Notre Dame
The next day, we got up early to go to the Louvre. Number 39 of The List, which Fedor and I, both hadn't done yet. We stayed for about 6 hours, during which we only saw some 15% of the actual museum... It is definitely a reason to go back again to Paris some time in the future!
But we really did have to leave, because we also wanted to visit the famous cemetery. And while I did like Père Lachaise, I was not as impressed as I had hoped to be. It's in quite a bad state of repair, with many damaged graves (who the fck damages a grave, seriously?????) and not nearly as many monumental graves as our Cimitero Monumentale in Milano. But it was interesting to see, nonetheless.
All in all, we had a very good time, but there wasn't enough of it....
Tonight, we fly to Duesseldorf for a superquick visit to my friend Stephie. We wanted to go a bit longer, but Ryanair has decided on our behalf that we should not go at 2PM, but instead at 10PM tonite, so we're not arriving until midnight. Hmmm, not very pleasant, but it'll be good to see Stephie, nonetheless!
Ciao,
OJ
So all that, and all the involved information-finding missions, have made it a bit of a stressfull week.
But, indeed, last weekend we were in Paris. And it was lovely!!! The Versailles Castle was great, and we spent nearly an entire day in the gardens and the castle (which was necessary to get good-value-for-money, because damn, it's expensive to get in there!!!)
However, most importantly, this was another point from The List (number 41, that is), so half of the Paris-mission was accomplished.
We then went on to see a lot of other famous sites, like the Notre Dame
The next day, we got up early to go to the Louvre. Number 39 of The List, which Fedor and I, both hadn't done yet. We stayed for about 6 hours, during which we only saw some 15% of the actual museum... It is definitely a reason to go back again to Paris some time in the future!
But we really did have to leave, because we also wanted to visit the famous cemetery. And while I did like Père Lachaise, I was not as impressed as I had hoped to be. It's in quite a bad state of repair, with many damaged graves (who the fck damages a grave, seriously?????) and not nearly as many monumental graves as our Cimitero Monumentale in Milano. But it was interesting to see, nonetheless.
All in all, we had a very good time, but there wasn't enough of it....
Tonight, we fly to Duesseldorf for a superquick visit to my friend Stephie. We wanted to go a bit longer, but Ryanair has decided on our behalf that we should not go at 2PM, but instead at 10PM tonite, so we're not arriving until midnight. Hmmm, not very pleasant, but it'll be good to see Stephie, nonetheless!
Ciao,
OJ
Thursday, September 27, 2007
Basta Banca Intesa
Oh My God... I have had my first positive Banking Experience in Italy!!! Last Monday, I went to Unicredit Banca to open a new bank account. As I posted recently, I was totally sick of bloody Banca Intesa and I really want to get rid of them. So therefore, I went to open a new bank account. Surprise #1: I was treated politely and respectfully. Suprise #2: opening a bank account here only took 1 day! In fact, it only took 1 hour! But the biggest surprise of all came when I mentioned that I already had an account with Banca Intesa that I was trying to get rid of: It turned out that this bank had the service of closing old accounts and transferring all kinds of account-related transfers et cetera. Of course, this is normal in countries with a civilised banking system, but to find such a thing in Italy was a huge shock to me! I realise that everything is bound to go wrong during this process, but for now it is making me very happy. And it saves me a lot of time of having to go to Banca Intesa and actually close the account myself (although I had psychologically prepared myself for making a scene there: that would have been fun....).
Another good thing is the fact that the account is really cheap: only 1€ per month (well, plus 9€ per 3 months, plus a charge for each transcation, but all of that is normal, right? Well, it is in this damned country).
The rest of the week was rather quiet. I worked a bit and started my teaching. In fact, I taught my first real class yesterday, a tutorial in Macroeconomics. It was exhausting I must admit, but I just ignored the fact that no-one was paying me any attention. After all, I am not getting paid for the number of people paying attention, but simply per hour! I just really hope that all the people who obviously didnt give a shit about the tutorial will not be there next time. That way, those who are interested may actually learn something (but once again: when I am getting 176€ per 45 minutes, you can put me in front of an empty wall and I will tell my story just as vividly!
Saturday we're leaving for 2 days in Paris: woooohooooooooooooooooooooo
Ciao,
OJ
Another good thing is the fact that the account is really cheap: only 1€ per month (well, plus 9€ per 3 months, plus a charge for each transcation, but all of that is normal, right? Well, it is in this damned country).
The rest of the week was rather quiet. I worked a bit and started my teaching. In fact, I taught my first real class yesterday, a tutorial in Macroeconomics. It was exhausting I must admit, but I just ignored the fact that no-one was paying me any attention. After all, I am not getting paid for the number of people paying attention, but simply per hour! I just really hope that all the people who obviously didnt give a shit about the tutorial will not be there next time. That way, those who are interested may actually learn something (but once again: when I am getting 176€ per 45 minutes, you can put me in front of an empty wall and I will tell my story just as vividly!
Saturday we're leaving for 2 days in Paris: woooohooooooooooooooooooooo
Ciao,
OJ
Sunday, September 23, 2007
lots of stress and gaiety
Well, it was an interesting return to Milano. All my mates were stressed out about the presentations of our first papers that were supposed to happen in that week, and as a result of that, it was obviously chaotic at University. I was not extremely stressed about it all, and it turned out that my presentation had been postponed by a week anyway, so I threw myself full-throttle into the other bureaucratic bitcheries that seem to inhabit the life of any person living in Italy... During the holidays, I had acquired 2 jobs as a Teaching Assistant for this semester. Or so I thought... Because it turned out very soon that something had gone wrong, and everyone had misunderstood each other and some emails never arrived and there was quite un casino (a chaos) going on. So, as a result of that, I only turned out to have 1 job as a TA for 16 hours this semester. Obviously, I was not happy about this (these are the extremely well-paid jobs that make life bearable as a PhD student, with its 176 euros an hour rate), so I decided to do it the Italian way. I got myself a secretary to agree with me and start fighting. Some gossiping, some acusing people of favouritsm, the standard Italian fare...
The result: I now have 16 hours as a TA, plus 56 hours as tutor (at 44 euros an hour), which gets me up to the maximum number of hours I am allowed to work this semester. In addition to that, I managed to get a new office and I am still aiming at getting a new fast computer in addition to that. Conclusion: I think I have done rather well for myself, the Italian way..... :-D Of course, it did take up a considerable amount of time that I may have been able to spend more usefully. Oh well, shit happens.
In addition to this, of course there was also the forementioned presentation to be had. While I wasnt nervous before, when the day itself finally arrived, I did get a bit freaked out after all. It actually did not go too bad, although I personally was not so satisfied. Professor Tabellini, however, did tell me that he thought it was quite good, and that is what matters! In other research-related news, I am now officially a published author!!! You can download my first real publication HERE, which is the website of the Review of Income and Wealth (September issue: pp. 422-439). If you don't have a University account and therefore cannot download the paper, but are interested in seeing a copy anyway.... Please send me an email and I can send you a copy. For copyright-related reasons, I am not allowed to post it online, but I am actually allowed to email copies to people. Also, I am (since Thursday) a MULTIPLY published author, because I also received the Summer-Autumn issue of the Baltic Journal of Economics (pp. 35-49)!!! This one will be available for download from HERE, but is not actually there yet. I don't have the file either, but I have 5 hardcopy issues of the Journal, so if you are interested, just tell me and I can give one to you...
So, that definitely made me very, very happy, and it made up a lot for the long-lasting stress caused by Banca Intesa. The bastards!!! I have posted here before about their "dear Sir, we are now closing your account"-message they sent in July, but I did not mention they did the same thing again in August. While we were on holiday, so it gave me quite a shock, I must say! Although, again it wasnt actually true and it turned out to be completely ignorable. At least, so I thought. But just now, when I tried to pay the rent, I discovered they did pull back the loan I had with them, so that sort of ruined my day. Although I have already created a way in which this is not going to be a problem in the end, it is rather inconvenient nonetheless. Tomorrow morning, I am opening a new account with another bank. That will make me feel soooooo good. FUCK BANCA INTESA!
Anyways, for the rest everything is going well. No visitors these weekends, but instead we can do many other things. Yesterday we had dinner at a colleague of Fedor's and tonite we are having some friends over for dinner. Lovely.
Next weekend: Paris!
And in answer to Gerwin's question, our trip in The East did not give us any extra wonders for the Hillman list. Which is why we are going to Paris next weekend, because we will have 1 (Fedor: Louvre) or 2 (me: Louvre and Versailles) new Wonders there!!! (both of us having done the Eiffel Tower already). I cannot wait...
Ciao,
OJ
The result: I now have 16 hours as a TA, plus 56 hours as tutor (at 44 euros an hour), which gets me up to the maximum number of hours I am allowed to work this semester. In addition to that, I managed to get a new office and I am still aiming at getting a new fast computer in addition to that. Conclusion: I think I have done rather well for myself, the Italian way..... :-D Of course, it did take up a considerable amount of time that I may have been able to spend more usefully. Oh well, shit happens.
In addition to this, of course there was also the forementioned presentation to be had. While I wasnt nervous before, when the day itself finally arrived, I did get a bit freaked out after all. It actually did not go too bad, although I personally was not so satisfied. Professor Tabellini, however, did tell me that he thought it was quite good, and that is what matters! In other research-related news, I am now officially a published author!!! You can download my first real publication HERE, which is the website of the Review of Income and Wealth (September issue: pp. 422-439). If you don't have a University account and therefore cannot download the paper, but are interested in seeing a copy anyway.... Please send me an email and I can send you a copy. For copyright-related reasons, I am not allowed to post it online, but I am actually allowed to email copies to people. Also, I am (since Thursday) a MULTIPLY published author, because I also received the Summer-Autumn issue of the Baltic Journal of Economics (pp. 35-49)!!! This one will be available for download from HERE, but is not actually there yet. I don't have the file either, but I have 5 hardcopy issues of the Journal, so if you are interested, just tell me and I can give one to you...
So, that definitely made me very, very happy, and it made up a lot for the long-lasting stress caused by Banca Intesa. The bastards!!! I have posted here before about their "dear Sir, we are now closing your account"-message they sent in July, but I did not mention they did the same thing again in August. While we were on holiday, so it gave me quite a shock, I must say! Although, again it wasnt actually true and it turned out to be completely ignorable. At least, so I thought. But just now, when I tried to pay the rent, I discovered they did pull back the loan I had with them, so that sort of ruined my day. Although I have already created a way in which this is not going to be a problem in the end, it is rather inconvenient nonetheless. Tomorrow morning, I am opening a new account with another bank. That will make me feel soooooo good. FUCK BANCA INTESA!
Anyways, for the rest everything is going well. No visitors these weekends, but instead we can do many other things. Yesterday we had dinner at a colleague of Fedor's and tonite we are having some friends over for dinner. Lovely.
Next weekend: Paris!
And in answer to Gerwin's question, our trip in The East did not give us any extra wonders for the Hillman list. Which is why we are going to Paris next weekend, because we will have 1 (Fedor: Louvre) or 2 (me: Louvre and Versailles) new Wonders there!!! (both of us having done the Eiffel Tower already). I cannot wait...
Ciao,
OJ
Sunday, September 16, 2007
looooooooong post
Guess what? This is going to be a loooooooong post. We have been back from our holiday for nearly a week already, but the past week has been so crazily busy that I did not manage to actually post anything about our vacation!
So, I will do this right now. We flew into Bucharest, which was actually surprisingly lovely. A lot of it is under construction, but you can clearly see that the level of welfare is increasing signficantly there. We wandered through the city, enjoyed the sights and visited some churches (trust me, you'll be reading more about churches....). The main attraction, however, of Bucharest is the Palace of Ceauşescu. An enormous structure (the 2nd biggest in the world, after the Pentagon), for which a significant part of the city was bulldozed. A 1-hour tour is not even nearly enough to see its magnificence, but we did see a dozen or so ornately decorated meeting rooms, as well as the grand ballroom: impressive, for sure!
Another interesting building is this building, which is the shell of the old Securitate building (the Romanian KGB), in which a new building has been constructed:
After 2 days in Bucharest, we took a night train to Chisinau, which was a very relaxing experience. You just sleep your way through the Romanian night and the Moldovan morning, without being bothered at all. And the views are gorgeous occassionally (most of it is flat as a pancake, so there are no cliffs or panoramas or anything, but it's still enjoyable)
Chisinau is an extremely pleasant town. It's city centre is very laid-back and there is very little stress. It's green, it's pleasant and important for us: it's dirt cheap. The National Museum was very interesting, despite the fact that we were being shadowed by a gang of museum ladies. Again, it's dirtcheap (20 cents for normal people, 5 cents for students), and absolutely worth spending an afternoon or so. Another major sight was the Armenian cemetery. As always, our trip consisted of visiting lots and lots of cemeteries, but the Armenian cemetery was definitely one of the most interesting ones. We also saw a bunch of churches and monasteries:
After Chisinau, we went to Odessa, read the previous post for that journey. I don't want to think about it anymore. Odessa wasn't actually very pleasant, but that probably had more to do with our state-of-mind than with the city itself. We limited ourselves to doing some of the compulsory sights, such as the Potemkin Stairs and quickly took the train to Kiev afterwards
Arriving in Kiev in the morning again, after another night in the train, we started wandering around. Sunday morning, 9 am, the city was quiet and stunning. But even when it got busier later, Kiev remained an absolutely lovely city. Very green, lots of big beautiful buildings and lots to do. We had 3 days, but that was actually not enough time to see everything. For our stay there, we negotiated with a lady at the central station for quite some time in order to rent an appartment. A huge appartment, that is, which was way too big for the two of us. But it was a nice way to relax for some time, do our laundry in the bathtub (seriously, what's a country without laundrettes???) and spend our evening watching television.
Kiev being the capital of the country and the standplace of the Ukrainian Orthodox church, there were also lots of churches to visit:
And monasteries, including the famous Caves Monastery, where for centuries the monks lived below the ground in a huge number of caves:
We also met with my friend Elena, who is a Bocconi colleague of mine. She showed us some other sights that we hadn't seen yet and showed us a great place to have dinner.
And finally, we started our gifts-shopping, because Kiev is a great place for shopping:
After all of that, we were quite exhausted when we took another night train to Kamyanets-Podilski. In addition to our exhaustion, the weather also took a turn for the worse so we did not do much there. We visited the fort of course, went to the village museum and saw a few churches, but that was all.
The next morning, we took a bus to Chernivtsi: a lovely student town with some very friendly people. In fact, we met a guy there who voluntarily gave us a big tour through the city, showing all his favourite churches (and as a Russian Orthodox guy, obviously the Russian Orthodox churches were the best ones....)
He was quite right though and showed us one of the most quaint churches I have ever seen:
After saying goodbye to Igor, we relaxed for some more time in Chernivtsi and had dinner before taking another night train to Lviv. Lviv was stunning, as expected. very kind people (far more people able to speak other languages than Russian and Ukrainian) and lots of beautiful buildings. It did have the same problem that many Eastern European cities seem to have nowadays: it's all under construction. Like Cracow, Vilnius and Bucharest, the city is being cleaned and reconstructed and everything is repainted in pinks and blues, but I guess that's part of the charm... The main attraction, however, from our point of view, is the cemetery. Also known as the Père Lachaise of the east, this is a huge piece of hilly land with over 400,000 graves. And it is stunning: quiet, overgrown but with lots of flowers. Definitely worth a visit!
After 3 days in Lviv (including lots of relaxing and some excellent food... And including lemon-coffee: don't ever try that!!!), we took a night bus into Cracow. A long bus ride, particularly because of the 5 hour wait at the border. But the price difference with the train was so much that we decided to do it this way anyway. So we arrived in Cracow at about 9 AM and spent the rest of the day walking through its lovely, but touristy, streets.
While it is definitely a beautiful city, it was also considerably more expensive than we were getting used to and very very touristy. So we quite enjoyed it, but it definitely was not my favourite. Also, the Jewish cemetery was distinctly unimpressive...
That night, we spent waiting at the bus terminal in the rain until 2.30 AM, when our bus arrived to bring us to Katowice Airport, from where we took a 6AM flight to the Netherlands.
In Holland, we saw many people, family, friends, etc, etc, and had a very good time at the wedding of Maartje and Edin (from which I hope to receive some photos at a later stage), but I really can't be bothered to write any more about it. We had a good time, in summary. At a later stage I'll share more about the stress at Uni this week, but now, I have to go and clean...
If you're interested in seeing more photos, you can do so at my Facebook account: CLICK HERE
Ciao,
OJ
So, I will do this right now. We flew into Bucharest, which was actually surprisingly lovely. A lot of it is under construction, but you can clearly see that the level of welfare is increasing signficantly there. We wandered through the city, enjoyed the sights and visited some churches (trust me, you'll be reading more about churches....). The main attraction, however, of Bucharest is the Palace of Ceauşescu. An enormous structure (the 2nd biggest in the world, after the Pentagon), for which a significant part of the city was bulldozed. A 1-hour tour is not even nearly enough to see its magnificence, but we did see a dozen or so ornately decorated meeting rooms, as well as the grand ballroom: impressive, for sure!
Another interesting building is this building, which is the shell of the old Securitate building (the Romanian KGB), in which a new building has been constructed:
After 2 days in Bucharest, we took a night train to Chisinau, which was a very relaxing experience. You just sleep your way through the Romanian night and the Moldovan morning, without being bothered at all. And the views are gorgeous occassionally (most of it is flat as a pancake, so there are no cliffs or panoramas or anything, but it's still enjoyable)
Chisinau is an extremely pleasant town. It's city centre is very laid-back and there is very little stress. It's green, it's pleasant and important for us: it's dirt cheap. The National Museum was very interesting, despite the fact that we were being shadowed by a gang of museum ladies. Again, it's dirtcheap (20 cents for normal people, 5 cents for students), and absolutely worth spending an afternoon or so. Another major sight was the Armenian cemetery. As always, our trip consisted of visiting lots and lots of cemeteries, but the Armenian cemetery was definitely one of the most interesting ones. We also saw a bunch of churches and monasteries:
After Chisinau, we went to Odessa, read the previous post for that journey. I don't want to think about it anymore. Odessa wasn't actually very pleasant, but that probably had more to do with our state-of-mind than with the city itself. We limited ourselves to doing some of the compulsory sights, such as the Potemkin Stairs and quickly took the train to Kiev afterwards
Arriving in Kiev in the morning again, after another night in the train, we started wandering around. Sunday morning, 9 am, the city was quiet and stunning. But even when it got busier later, Kiev remained an absolutely lovely city. Very green, lots of big beautiful buildings and lots to do. We had 3 days, but that was actually not enough time to see everything. For our stay there, we negotiated with a lady at the central station for quite some time in order to rent an appartment. A huge appartment, that is, which was way too big for the two of us. But it was a nice way to relax for some time, do our laundry in the bathtub (seriously, what's a country without laundrettes???) and spend our evening watching television.
Kiev being the capital of the country and the standplace of the Ukrainian Orthodox church, there were also lots of churches to visit:
And monasteries, including the famous Caves Monastery, where for centuries the monks lived below the ground in a huge number of caves:
We also met with my friend Elena, who is a Bocconi colleague of mine. She showed us some other sights that we hadn't seen yet and showed us a great place to have dinner.
And finally, we started our gifts-shopping, because Kiev is a great place for shopping:
After all of that, we were quite exhausted when we took another night train to Kamyanets-Podilski. In addition to our exhaustion, the weather also took a turn for the worse so we did not do much there. We visited the fort of course, went to the village museum and saw a few churches, but that was all.
The next morning, we took a bus to Chernivtsi: a lovely student town with some very friendly people. In fact, we met a guy there who voluntarily gave us a big tour through the city, showing all his favourite churches (and as a Russian Orthodox guy, obviously the Russian Orthodox churches were the best ones....)
He was quite right though and showed us one of the most quaint churches I have ever seen:
After saying goodbye to Igor, we relaxed for some more time in Chernivtsi and had dinner before taking another night train to Lviv. Lviv was stunning, as expected. very kind people (far more people able to speak other languages than Russian and Ukrainian) and lots of beautiful buildings. It did have the same problem that many Eastern European cities seem to have nowadays: it's all under construction. Like Cracow, Vilnius and Bucharest, the city is being cleaned and reconstructed and everything is repainted in pinks and blues, but I guess that's part of the charm... The main attraction, however, from our point of view, is the cemetery. Also known as the Père Lachaise of the east, this is a huge piece of hilly land with over 400,000 graves. And it is stunning: quiet, overgrown but with lots of flowers. Definitely worth a visit!
After 3 days in Lviv (including lots of relaxing and some excellent food... And including lemon-coffee: don't ever try that!!!), we took a night bus into Cracow. A long bus ride, particularly because of the 5 hour wait at the border. But the price difference with the train was so much that we decided to do it this way anyway. So we arrived in Cracow at about 9 AM and spent the rest of the day walking through its lovely, but touristy, streets.
While it is definitely a beautiful city, it was also considerably more expensive than we were getting used to and very very touristy. So we quite enjoyed it, but it definitely was not my favourite. Also, the Jewish cemetery was distinctly unimpressive...
That night, we spent waiting at the bus terminal in the rain until 2.30 AM, when our bus arrived to bring us to Katowice Airport, from where we took a 6AM flight to the Netherlands.
In Holland, we saw many people, family, friends, etc, etc, and had a very good time at the wedding of Maartje and Edin (from which I hope to receive some photos at a later stage), but I really can't be bothered to write any more about it. We had a good time, in summary. At a later stage I'll share more about the stress at Uni this week, but now, I have to go and clean...
If you're interested in seeing more photos, you can do so at my Facebook account: CLICK HERE
Ciao,
OJ
Friday, August 24, 2007
Transdnistria
A quick message from Odessa. Bucharest was pretty nice and the train journey from there to Chisinau was very relaxing. Chisinau itself was suprisingly lovely. Very green, very calm, lovely people (lots of Italian speakers, that was convenient). But today we went to Odessa and it wasnt fun... Our bus got cancelled, so we had to transfer to a different bus. Not only was this bus 2 hours later, but it also went through Transdnistria, which I really would have preferred to avoid. So, as expected, we were searched completely and they found some of our money at the "border". After taking 50, we could go on (euros that is). However, at the other end of transdnistria, we werent allowed to leave. At least, not until we gave them another 50 euros for all their troubles. Then the Ukrainian border officials also had a bad day and decided to put us in an unnecessary queue for another hour (all of this in the scorching heat. Its BLOODY HOT HERE).
Finally, we did make it out but by the time we got to Odessa, we werent happy (Also, Fedor has stomach problems.....). And here of course, all hotels are full... It never ends, does it?
Finally, we found something (not cheap, but comfy) and now we are finally ready to enjoy a little bit of Odessa...
Ciao,
OJ
Finally, we did make it out but by the time we got to Odessa, we werent happy (Also, Fedor has stomach problems.....). And here of course, all hotels are full... It never ends, does it?
Finally, we found something (not cheap, but comfy) and now we are finally ready to enjoy a little bit of Odessa...
Ciao,
OJ
Sunday, August 19, 2007
holidaaaaaaaaaaaaay
After last weekend's visit to La Bella Toscana, this week consisted of more work. Not very intensively, I admit, but work nonetheless. By now, I was actually the only person still left in the office, with the exception of Lin Lin who comes in occassionally, so it was very quiet. Like the rest of Milan. Because everything is currently closed. Thankfully, there are some supermarkets still opened, but it is generally very quiet. You can safely cross the road without paying attention, because cars are very few as well.
On Thursday, I locked up my office and went home: My Holiday Has Commenced! On Friday, we took the train to go to Monate (near Lago Maggiore), to stay with our friends Enrico and Belinda. They showed us their house and after a bit of lunch, we spent the rest of the day at Lago Monate, a small chrystal-clear lake about 60kms away from Milano. It was incredibly enjoyable
In the evening, we had pizza and then met up with Enrico's cousin and her husband (who were also staying in the same town, of course: they're Italians after all!) to go to a local Festival. It was interesting, to say the least.....
Imagine the following: A stage where a blond girl (Valentina) stands mumbling, with the rest of her band (Orchestra Valentina) around her. The music they are playing is mostly Bavarian-sounding Humpapa music, in Italian. In fron of the stage, there is a large dancefloor where the entire village is swirling round-and-round. Around the dancefloor, there are long tables where people drink beer and wine (very cheap, I must say). If you are now thinking of the Oktoberfesten in Munich: that is pretty much the picture I was indeed trying to paint. Quite a shock, I must say. Of course, this did not stop me and Belinda from participating and dancing our little legs off! The moment where the entire village started line dancing, however, was our cue to get off the dancefloor. But much fun was had, nonetheless!!!
Yesterday, we came back to Milano and went our for dinner with my ex-flatmate Meghan and her most recent (Dutch) conquest: An interesting guy, whose mother was born in the same village where I grew up.... It's a small world, after all, don't you think?
Today we cleaned the house and prepared for leaving. Because tomorrow morning (REALLY early), we will fly to Bucharest, from where we are going to be enjoying our holidays (general itinerary: Bucharest-Chisinau-Odessa-Kiev-KamianetsPodilsky-Lviv-Cracow-Holland (where we want to see people: let me know whether we will see you and where.....)
Ciao,
OJ
On Thursday, I locked up my office and went home: My Holiday Has Commenced! On Friday, we took the train to go to Monate (near Lago Maggiore), to stay with our friends Enrico and Belinda. They showed us their house and after a bit of lunch, we spent the rest of the day at Lago Monate, a small chrystal-clear lake about 60kms away from Milano. It was incredibly enjoyable
In the evening, we had pizza and then met up with Enrico's cousin and her husband (who were also staying in the same town, of course: they're Italians after all!) to go to a local Festival. It was interesting, to say the least.....
Imagine the following: A stage where a blond girl (Valentina) stands mumbling, with the rest of her band (Orchestra Valentina) around her. The music they are playing is mostly Bavarian-sounding Humpapa music, in Italian. In fron of the stage, there is a large dancefloor where the entire village is swirling round-and-round. Around the dancefloor, there are long tables where people drink beer and wine (very cheap, I must say). If you are now thinking of the Oktoberfesten in Munich: that is pretty much the picture I was indeed trying to paint. Quite a shock, I must say. Of course, this did not stop me and Belinda from participating and dancing our little legs off! The moment where the entire village started line dancing, however, was our cue to get off the dancefloor. But much fun was had, nonetheless!!!
Yesterday, we came back to Milano and went our for dinner with my ex-flatmate Meghan and her most recent (Dutch) conquest: An interesting guy, whose mother was born in the same village where I grew up.... It's a small world, after all, don't you think?
Today we cleaned the house and prepared for leaving. Because tomorrow morning (REALLY early), we will fly to Bucharest, from where we are going to be enjoying our holidays (general itinerary: Bucharest-Chisinau-Odessa-Kiev-KamianetsPodilsky-Lviv-Cracow-Holland (where we want to see people: let me know whether we will see you and where.....)
Ciao,
OJ
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)