It Decided to Snow Again

Hello!

Look, I'm getting better about updating my blog!

This morning I woke up to snow, again. It came out of nowhere, the weather forecast said nothing about snow. I am not actually sick of snow yet, the only reason why I groaned is because it meant that it would be quite cold outside. But I still enjoy walking when the snowflakes are falling, and it's kind of magical. I would still love to go somewhere warm, perhaps a trip to Greece or the South of France would be a good idea one of these weekends?

Which brings me to my next point, now that I'm more or less acquainted with Amsterdam and settled into a routine, it's time to take advantage of my close proximity to so many European countries and travel! But I have no idea where to go :( I think I definitely want to travel into Belgium, since it's relatively cheap to travel within Benelux (that's Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg in case you didn't know, they are so small that they group themselves into one country). I have a few long weekends, and I think for one of those long weekends I'll see about venturing to London. I would also like to travel to Germany, I would really like to go back to Berlin. But my plan is to mostly see where other people are going and go with them, since that way I'll have travel buddies.

Oh, another point. In my last post I said you cannot buy coffee at a coffeeshop. Apparently I was wrong, see, the coffeeshops can't advertise that they sell marijuana, hence why they are called coffeeshops. So you can go in and get a cup of coffee, just be aware that you will be surrounded by mostly American and British tourists getting high. So it's a cup of coffee with a free show.

I know that one of my mother's concerns with me coming here was the legalized marijuana aspect of the city. One thing I have realized in talking to my new friends I have met here is that no one came here with the specific intent to get high for a semester. And our course work is so hard, it's difficult to find the time to do so. Yes, there is a lot of drinking going on, but it is more of a cultural thing. People don't get drunk and are happy just milling about and talking. And like I've said before, if your drink is non-alcoholic it's really not a big deal. The Dutch enjoy a good debate, and that is difficult to achieve if the other party is slurring their words.

Another one of my mother's concerns was whether I would eat here or not. Well Mother, at 20 years old I hope that I am capable of feeding myself, but this is a good time to discuss my kitchen facilities or lack there of. See, my kitchen consists of a gas stove top that I have to turn a knob to turn on the gas, then light a match to get the flame going, and a mini-refrigerator. I know no one else who lives in student housing who has an oven, and some lucky ducks get a microwave. Mostly, I've been eating a lot of pasta, sandwiches, and salads. Over the weekend I attempted to make tacos, however was faced with the issue of having leftover taco filling and no microwave to heat it back up. I discovered if you add water to the meat and heat it in the frying pan again, it makes more of the sauce part and works out pretty well. I am going to try to figure out some other things to make, since I'm not going out to eat as often as I thought I would. Which is fine, because going out to eat is much more expensive than cooking for myself. Oh, and another cultural difference- here they do not do take-out containers. If you don't finish your meal at a restaurant, they take your food away and you never see it again. I haven't dared asked for a box and never have I been offered one to pack up my food. But the portions here are much smaller than in America, so it's not like I can make 3 meals out of one restaurant dinner.

Ok, time to tackle some of that reading I need to get done for tomorrow. Until next time!

Laura