Visit from Italy and preparations.

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Hello all,

I'm back here in The Netherlands for one week....and it's very cold!!! I arrived Wednesday and worked on Thursday (half a day) and Friday the whole day. Also yesterday and today I worked, and tomorrow for the last time.

Francesca, a 22 year old girl from Rome, came to visit me during the last weekend. She's originally from the small town Villa Rosa, which is in Abruzzo, Italy. She studied in Rome and is still living there. I know here since 2003 from a penfriends website. She also likes to travel, get to know cultures, languages and make friends abroad. She's a nice, sweet and goodlooking girl, dresses stylish and she speaks pretty well English (something that you can't say about Italians in general). She stayed at a hostel in Rotterdam, since I'm staying with my sister myself. She arrived Friday late in the afternoon and then I took her to the hostel. Then we went to my aunt and cousins where we had dinner. Saturday we spent almost the whole day in Amsterdam visiting The Dam, Van Gogh Museum and Red Light district among others. Later that afternoon we met with Peter in the city, he was with a friend and we went to drink something. Amsterdam was pretty busy, especially later in the afternoon...of course lots of tourists. In the evening we went out in Rotterdam and also met with Ning, a friend of mine who played a few years in the same volleyballteam as I did. We didn't make it until the early hours of the morning, since Franzy had to go to Brussels the next morning. There she went to visit a cousin and stayed the whole day. I took advantage of this day to wash some clothes and start packing the backpack. Yesterday I worked in the morning and in the afternoon we met and I took her to see a little bit of Rotterdam. In the evening we went to eat at a Surinamese restaurant together with my sister, Caresse.

I was glad that she came, although it wasn't in the best period: weather was not so nice, I had to work, I was pretty tired from my earlier journeys and I was also doing my preparations to leave Thursday. But I'm sure she had a good time and that she enjoyed her short stay here in The Netherlands!

Now I'm preparing to leave on Thursday. There were a lot of paperwork I had to finish these days and finally I'm almost ready. The big backpack is ready, only the small one I'll prepare tomorrow. Finally the "real challange" is going to start. I'm flying Cathay Pacific from Amsterdam to Hong Kong, which takes 12 to 13 hours. I'll spend one whole day in Hong Kong and then continue for 8 to 9 more hours to Sydney, where I'll arrive on Saturday. The three most important things to be done after arriving: get the stamp for the "Work Holiday Visa" in my passport, and also get a social security number (sofi-nummer) and open an Australian bank-account. These last two probably can be done starting Monday and not in the weekend. After this I'll search for a shared accomodation and of course a job! I started to look on the internet already and sent my CV to some email addresses. Finding a job and shared accomodation shouldn't be difficult, but still...it is a challange because you'll arrive to an unknown place. But I'm confident everything will be allright. I will take whatever job they offer me at the beginning, and meanwhile I'll continue to look for other jobs. I'd like to work in hospitality and tourism though....restaurants, cafe's, hotels etc.

Anyway....take care all and God bless you!!!

Elton

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Comments

[els]

was ik nog maar 25 jaar jonger!! (voel met nu ook 'oud', zit tot over de oren in het huiswerk, de tentamens staan weer voor de deur) Elton, geniet ervan nu het nog kan. Veel succes in Australië! Els

[rocio carolina]

oh my!
so u r even looking for a job?wow,well succes!u have a huge pair of balls!hahaha