I have been a bit slow updating everyone on what has been going on. Sorry about that. Thanksgiving has come and gone, Christmas is just around the corner. Hard to believe the holidays are in full swing. Yesterday was Sinterklass (December 5th), the children’s holiday and the day children across The Netherlands get presents. Christmas is a religious holiday and not so focused on gift giving. There has been talk of Sinter-stress because more and more children here are beginning to expect gifts on both Sinterkass and Christmas, the influence of ex-pats. So many presents so little time!

My dog-sitting duties have come to an end. Kristina came home Thursday Dec. 7th. Her mom was moved into a skilled nursing center and should be home in a few weeks. Frank returned five day later. His dad is recovering and is doing fine. Mojo is glad to have me back full time.

It’s been an interesting past few weeks at work. About a week and a half ago we had a bomb scare. A suspicious package showed up at our back gate and the building was shut down for a few hours. Everything checked out OK. And a week later we had legionaries detected in the water-cooling system. Everyone got to go home a half day early. Of course all of us began to become paranoid and thought that we were all coming down with it. The amount found was so small the Dutch health authority said there was really no danger to the work force. That does not stop the imagination.

Dec. 19th:

As you can tell I have been working on this in shifts. Today is the second day of court recess and there is really nothing to do, so I write. Our office is undergoing some long over due re-wiring and I have no phone or work computer though that does not stop me from working on my laptop. One of my co-workers, Guido, just came in and is arguing with the person doing the wiring. They are talking in Dutch, though body language is pretty much the same in any language and I could tell that my co-worker was upset that his desk had tools and stuff on it. Rene from FMU (building maintenance) did do some translating. After that I reminded Guido that Rene was doing us a big favor. Armin came in and said it was time for coffee. I’m off for coffee and will continue in a while.

Back from coffee: This past Friday was our director’s office party. We brought in a small generic gift for 5 euros and I introduced the gift giving game that a bunch of us “cooking club” people use to play when we did our December cooking club/white elephant gift exchange. The gift exchange game from the year before was not so popular because it took to long. This one is fairly quick and to the point. For those of you unfamiliar with the game it is very simple. Everyone picks a number, “one” gets first choice of the wrapped presents. “Two” can take the unwrapped gift from one or take another gift from under the tree. If two takes the gift from one then one chooses another wrapped gift. Three then gets to choose from one or two; you get the idea. The last number can choose from all the others or take the last gift. There sometimes is an advantage to being last. It can be a lot of fun and our group had a lively exchange. And of course there was munchies and drinking. We cycled through wine, champagne and some whisky from the technicians next door. That day a few of us started drinking at three and continued on and off until midnight. A group of us were invited to Steven and Bilijana’s for dinner. It is dangerous to have back-to-back parties.

The next morning, Kristina, Bilijana and I headed off to Munster Germany to experience the cities Christmas market. We were all at the train station at 8 am and none of us felt very chipper. The day started out to be cold and rainy so we started with coffee and croissants. Next train stop it was more coffee and an appleflaps. Next stop a kassoufflé (basically deep fried cheese square). Yes we ate our way across the Netherlands into Germany. Once in Germany (still cold and rainy) we had to buy pretzels. After finding our way to the Christmas market it was on to the gluhwein (mulled wine). We had a choice between a shot of amaretto or rum and of course there was a gluhwein stand on every corner. Buy late afternoon we were wandering around with our ceramic gluhwein cups without a care in the world.

Munster is a lovely city. I would like to go back again someday for a more extensive tour. The Christmas market was wrapped around the town hall square and extended out and around the main town shopping area. The craft booths were small wooded structures with pitched roofs. Some looked like gingerbread houses. There were four separate markets that more or less flowed from one to the other, with the only difference being a slightly different look to the booths and different gluhwein mugs in some cases. There was candy, food, and high quality handcrafts. Also some manufactured Christmas items, lots of good stuff. I didn’t go to crazy due to the fact I had to pack it all back onto the train. Being limited to what I could carry is a good thing. I did get a traditional Christmas pyramid. They are made of wood with a balsawood fan that is run by candlepower and turns a table with a Christmas scene. I have wanted one for ages, oh and gifts for others.

Of course we also went to the grocery store and bought some German food goodies, not all bratwurst. I think I was loaded down with more food items then anything. Some traditional egg noodles like the ones my grandmother makes, hearty German sandwich bread, brine pork chops, lots of candy, interesting looking caned goods and yes brawts.

After food, shopping, gluhwein and hot coco with peppermint schnapps, we headed back to the train station and started for home on the 8:30 pm train. We landed back in The Hague at 11:30, dragging our tired bodies to a waiting car. Frank was very kind to come and pick us up at the train station then taking us to our doors. We were all exhausted.

The next day Sunday, I spent it sleeping, cleaning and doing last minute shopping getting ready for the following week and preparing for Switzerland. I’m having a gathering of friends over on Monday night before all of us go our separate ways for the holidays and I used this day to prepare.

Monday was the first day of court recess and the building is starting to empty out. Our office will spend the week cleaning and we have a rewiring project going on to clean up all the loose wires coming out of our wall. I have this Thursday and Friday off as stand-by days. Between stand-by days and holidays I will have almost two weeks off and only have to use two vacation days. This Friday we all leave for Switzerland and one day next week we will be skiing in the shadow of the Matterhorn.

I wish all my family and friends the best this Christmas and wish a great New Year to all!

Kim