I Could Go East, I Could Go West, It Was All Up To Me To Decide

I woke up before noon today, which was a lot more than I had planned on doing.  :-)  I have had a very nice, slow Saturday.  I went to the market and I went shoe shopping.  I need new shoes.  The ones I currently wear are 8 years old!  So I'm on the search.  Unfortunately, the cute shoes are expensive and the affordable shoes are awful.  Haha, ah well, my 8 year old shoes are still sewn together, so I suppose there's no rush.

I chatted with my mom again today.  She cheered me on.  We gossiped about my friends and her friends.  We laughed.  Funny how being half a world away brings us together.

I decided today I really need to work on my Dutch.  It has always amazed me how many people live in a country for a year or more without learning the language.  Now I understand how that happens.  I'm always surrounded by International students who don't speak Dutch, so I speak English most of the time.  I'm hardly ever around Dutch people, but when I am, they speak English to me.  I can speak a lot of Dutch considering I had my first lesson only three months ago.  But I'm not working on it enough.  Yesterday I lead a woman from Amsterdam to the bar she was searching for ( I was going to pass it anyway, so she just walked with me.)  She offered to speak English, but I insisted we speak in Dutch.  And I did just fine!  

So tonight I watched The Little Mermaid in Dutch.  I'm going to throw myself back into my Dutch books, and speak Dutch to my Dutch friends more often.  When I look for a new apartment, I'm going to try to find one with Dutch students instead of other Internationals.  I love my international friends, and I love my international world, but I don't feel connected to this country, and I want to be.  I don't want to live here for two years and have nothing to show for it but pictures.  I want to paint this country on my heart.  I want to love it.  I want to miss it when I go.

I know this is the place I need to be.  Holland connects this world in ways I hadn't expected.  They had colonies from Surinam to Indonesia!  From here I can jump to either end of the world!  I've been giving it some thought, and I'm thinking about the possibilities of going east to teach English.  I have friends who've done this in Korea and China, and they've loved every minute of it, they've been so rewarded by the experiences.  Maybe I'll go west to Surinam (if I can learn Dutch well enough!) and teach English there.  Maybe I'll go to Spain, or Sweden, or Cairo, Istanbul, Mongolia to teach English.  It's not a career, just something I feel I should do, could do well.  Could love.

3.October: Leids Ontzet

This is me at 2am last night; after two days of not sleeping.  I had good reason to do this.  Yesterday, you see, was the 3rd of October, the most important holiday in Leiden.  In 1574 Leiden was under siege.  The country was under Spanish control, and Dutch rebels had been fighting them.  The Spanish were ruthless, and wiped out entire villages to stop the rebels.  The rebels, called the Geuzen (peasants), flooded the fields around Leiden to weaken the Spanish forces camped there.  It was October, after all, and camping in a foot of water is no fun, even when it's warm.  So, on October 3rd, 1574, the Dutch fleet managed to defeat the Spanish fleet, and the soggy Spanish in the fields fled.  Leiden was freed!  The Geuzen rushed in with herring and white bread to feed the starving citizens, and a boy looting the Spanish camp found a pot of potato and onion stew, called Hutspot, and that was also served to the people.  Traditions begin.  Every year on 3.October the people of Leiden eat herring and white bread, and Hutspot to celebrate the city's freedom.  Leids Ontzet:Leiden's Relief.

The party actually starts on the 2nd of October.  It's amazing.  The streets literally fill with people, so thick you can't move.  There is music and dancing, in the streets, and a fair with rides and games.  I went out with a huge group of people (mostly Italians, but there were a few Germans, and an Iranian guy, Farhad.)  We wandered the streets (in the rain) and ate olieballen (oil balls: think funnel cake balls) and danced and enjoyed the evening.  At some point Farhad and I got separated from the group, so we went to the fair and rode the rides and watched the games.  Farhad had never been to a fair before (!) so it was amazing to experience something so common through the eyes of another.  :-)  We met up again with the group, plus a few people from Taiwan, and a guy from Korea.  Fred (Taiwan) and Yoon (Korea) both told me that I must come to their countries and teach English.  They then fought over whose country would pay me more.  They both agreed I should not go to China.  :-)  The newly reunited group spent the rest of the evening playing at the fair and dancing in the street discos.  :-D

I took a nap and woke up at 6am.  ISN-R organized a tour of the city's 3.October activities in English.  We went to the town hall and sang the city's anthem, and followed a procession through the streets to hear the Mayor speak about the history of the town and to make fun of Spanish people.  We ate the traditional herring and bread breakfast (sort of like Sülze the taste is actually ok, it's the texture that makes me want to die.  Very gooey.  Urgh, yuck.)  We went to a museum of Leiden history and got to see artifacts that were looted from the Spanish camp!  Spanish playing cards from 1574!  There was also the original pot that the Hutspot was found in!  Cool!  We watched street performers.  The best was a woman dressed in red on a red ball as tall as I am, dancing with a puppet 3m (10ft) tall controlled by a man on the street.  Amazing.  (I found out today that my mom used to do this sort of ball-dance!!  I mean, without the puppet man, but... !!!!)  There was also a parade, which was hilarious, and a lot of fun.  

I then went home and took another quick nap, and then hit the streets again.  Back to the fair, back to the dances, back to the day.  :-)  Jan Claus (Italy-Holland) and I went to the fireworks that ended the festivities.  I adore fireworks.  I don't know that I'll ever get tired of them.  I love the colored ones, I love the sparkly ones, I love the ones that buzz and scream like angry insects.  I love them all.  But my favorite ones are simply flashes of light, and a loud, heart shaking boom.  Just light and sound.  Jan Claus and I went back to the fair and played the games and ate olieballen and talked and laughed and laughed.  He studies archaeology and is interested in religions and how they interact, so we had a lot to talk about.  I finally got home, and chatted for a bit with my mom, before mustering the energy to climb into bed and sleep at last.  

Leiden, trots van Nederlands steden

Parel van het Hollands land

Stad van heden vol verleden

Stad van werk met hart en hand

Plaats van dromen en van daad

Waar ieder blijft en niemand gaat

Leiden stad van denken en doen

Stad van mijn hart door nu en toen

(Leiden, pride of Dutch cities

Pearl of the land of Holland

City of the present full of the past

City of the work of  heart and hand

Place of dreams and of deeds

Where everyone stays and no one leaves

Leiden, city of thinking and doing

City of my heart through now and then.)

I wore the traditional white scarf.  I wore the traditional red and white fingerless gloves (no fingers so you can still eat the herring.)  I ate the traditional herring.  I sang the traditional songs.  I jumped into the culture of this place, and I caught a glimpse of Leiden as it is.  I'm beginning to really love this little town of dromen en daad, of denken en doen.

Thursday 2.Oct.08

This entry will certainly be overshadowed by the following entry about 3.October.  But I wanted to post quickly anyway.  It's the little things.

What I wanted to post about was a breakthrough I had.  I managed to sit in the library and translate for 3 hours straight without getting frustrated.  I actually enjoyed it!  Here's my secret:

I listened to the Zencast on my iPod while I studied.  Any time I found myself getting frustrated, I'd just focus on what the lecturer was saying, and it would just melt away.  :-)

My 100th Entry: Psalm 100

Make a joyful noise to the Lord, all the earth .

Worship the Lord with gladness;

Come into his presence with singing.

Know that the Lord is God.

It is he that made us; we are his.

We are his people, and the sheep of his pasture.

Enter his gates with thanksgiving,

And his courts with praise.

Give thanks to him, bless his name.

For the Lord is good; 

And his steadfast love endures forever,

And his faithfulness to all generations.

For my 100th entry I decided I needed something a bit special.  So I scoured various writings, looking at the 100th Sura, the 100th Chapter of this text, the 100th Saying of this Prophet.  I found quotes about trusting the Lord in battle, and praising the Buddhas for showing the way to the Truth, and even one quote that warned women were not to be trusted.  In the end, the quote I chose to post: Psalm 100.

Know This and You Will Know Everything

Nothing whatsoever 

is worth clinging to.

--The Buddha

Greek Statues and Peacock Colored Wings

I had a dream last night that I was in a Greek temple (painted bright colors) fighting an enormous statue of Perseus.  I was a hero, and so I had super human strength, and was able to avoid him.  I was terrified of him until I realized that we were just reenacting a dream I had about fighting a huge statue of Perseus.  Turns out we were really friends.  

Perseus was the hero who killed Medusa, but I don't think this is important.  Perseus was helped out by the god Hermes, and I think that's the key.  Hermes gives him all his stuff so he can fight the gorgon, so I think Perseus represents him in this dream.  Hermes is the god of boundaries, and thus also of the people who cross them (ie. travelers)  so he's always been a favorite of mine (the gods of the crossroads always are.)  I've been thinking about this dream all day, because it was so intense.  Clearly telling me something.  I think it's telling me that what I think I fear is really a friend of mine.  Could my subconscious be more clear about this?  I am fighting change that I should be embracing.  Add this to my snake dream of last night (snakes are also a symbol of Hermes, btw!) and maybe I should let my soul cat out of the bedroom I hid it in....

Anyway, today was another fascinating Dutch day.  The weather changed so many times, it was just too hard to keep up with.  I met with my group for the Mastaba presentation tomorrow.  I listened to a great Zen lecture between classes.  (Know this and you will know everything:  Nothing whatsoever is worth clinging to.)  Coptic was great, we translated and read, and learned, and giggled, and I just love this language.  Perro.

I came home and chatted with my mom for a while.  Very good for us both, I think.  She's going through some rough times as well.  Stress from work, and family, and friends, and the cat, and just lots of little things all tumbling down.  So we vented, and laughed, and sang country songs, and life was better for us both!

ISN-R meeting followed by drinks at Proost, where I got to chat with Marijn for a long time.  I also met David (USA) who is a former board member.  We'll be meeting up this weekend for coffee to discuss some of the things I have to do.  I have A LOT to do.  Though, I'm still having fun with it.

In other news:  I've noticed an interesting change in myself.  Ever since I moved to the Netherlands, I've been dressing myself in blues and greens.  I'm not doing this intentionally.  I've pretty much always been a spectrum of reds.  But everything I've bought for myself here, sweaters, jackets, scarves, even towels, have all been blue or green or some combination of the two.  I've always loved these colors (I love just about every color you can throw at me, truthfully, and I don't tend to acknowledge clashing laws) but for some reason I just keep reaching out to them in a way I never did before.  I'm exploring my turquoise side!  :-)

I wrote a long time ago that I was an emerging butterfly with peacock colored wings.  I suppose I wasn't too far off, afterall.

Horoscope for Week of 2.October

"New ideas show up disguised innocently as interruptions, contradictions, and embarrassing dilemmas," says motivational speaker Rob Lebow. "Beware of total strangers and friends alike who shower you with comfortable sameness, and remain open to those who make you uneasy, for they are the true messengers of the future." That excellent advice is my birthday present to you, Libra. If you make use of it during the next three weeks, I bet you'll consistently be in the right place at the right time to extract the maximum benefit from your blind dates with destiny. 

www.freewillastrology.com