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Published: December 6th 2007
Having fun!
Enjoying our first night of partyingSo, I am really into my new Couch Surfing adventures, they have all proved to be a fabulous time and there is always some kind of activity going on in the world. I love meeting people that are so like-minded and open to let you stay at their home, feed you breakfast, in return for some friendly conversation. If you are interested, check it out, www.couchsurfing.com.
I headed to Rotterdam last weekend to join over 100 people for the 2007 Sinterklaas Rotterdam Couch Surfing event. I was told about the event through some of my Couch Surfing friends in Cologne and Lille. A few weeks ago, I secured a place to stay with my host Renia. I figured out a few days before who her other guests would be and was anxiously waiting to meet everyone.
Sinterklaas (Saint Nikolai) is a tradition in the Netherlands, you can read about the wonderful phenomenon here.. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinterklaas
My train was
Craig
New friend that I met up with in Hamburg before the meeting in Rotterdam (he is from New Zealand and traveling around the world for 2 years) supposed to leave at about 9:45 in the morning from Hamburg, but as is typical of the Deutsche Bahn, the train was really late. I was later told that some of the local punks and their dogs made it on to the tracks in the Schanze in hamburg and therefore the trains were unable to get to the main train station. While I was standing there trying to figure out what was going on, I met a new friend, Luis from Mexico City. He lives in Hamburg and was heading to a small town close to Amsterdam to visit his girlfriend. We stuck together on the trip that morning since we had missed all of our connections and had to figure out a completely new route.
I eventually made it to Rotterdam after an extra 2 1/2 hrs and stops in Munster, Ultrecht, and then Rotterdam. I followed Renia's directions to the bus and then over to her house on an island in the harbor of Rotterdam. I was immediately welcomed by Renia and Frank (another surfer from the Netherlands). We chatted for a while and I met her friendly cat. We headed out after that and met up
Tom
Friend from Cologne! with Renia's boyfriend for a fabulous dinner at an Italian restaurant downtown. I was surprised at how much on the menu I could understand from the German that I knew. After dinner and great conversation we headed over to the Irish Pub for the welcome party. I enjoyed seeing plenty of old friends as well as meeting a lot of new ones from all over the world. We all drank beer, socialized and got to know each other. We walked back in some blowing rain to Renia's house on the Island which was quite an experience. The wind can be quite strong there. But it was a comfortable night and we slept in a bit on Saturday.
After waking up, showers, and having a fabulous breakfast with Renia, Frank, and Isabelle (CS from Vienna), all of us except Renia set out to explore the city on a beautiful sunny day! We walked around a bit, visited a local market where we tried some fresh Sroopwaffels. There were some fabulous "american toys" and other gadgets, really there was just about everything. I bought myself a new hat that i quite like. You can see in attached pictures. After our personal
Pringles Machine
Yeah they had a pringles machine in the bar! tour of the city, we met up wtih the Couch Surfing group for a "city walking tour' which really turned into a "walking adventure". We eventually a few hours later ended up at a local brewery where we tried a tasting. Then we headed over to the Restaurant where there was a buffet waiting for us. I sat at the "german speaking table" and enjoyed some friendly conversation, amazed at how much my skills have improved. We enjoyed the food and a couple of beers and headed over to the real party.
The Rotterdam group had reserved a bar for our party and had plenty of cookies, candy, and beer (maybe beer is not part of the original tradition)...everyone was supposed to bring a white elephant type gift of their own, wrapped with a poem as per tradition. I think we were all quite drunk when Sinterklaas arived, with his Zwarze Pete (helper). He said a few words to us, remarkably spoke english...and then we all passed around our gifts. I chose one that had a good shake to it and was satisfied. Then I opened it and well...I received some Rat Trap Poison from Turkey. very funny...i think.
Couch and Frank
This was my bed for 2 nights (very comfy) and thats Frank from the netherlands haha. Anyways, we had fun playing with all kinds of games and innapropriate gifts for the rest of the night. At the end of the party we stopped over for some typical late night Dutch food...i have no idea what it was, but my host told me to order it, so i went for it. It was wonderful.
Sunday morning was very rough, but we managed to pull ourselves out of good sleep to get up for the goodbye brunch. Renia's mom is a fabulous cook and she arranged the brunch at a local community center. It was great to see everyone one last time befor heading out and the food was absolutely wonderful, and much needed. :-) I hitchced a ride from two of the other surfers from Renia's flat, Alex and David to the train station. Luckily there weren't any problems really on the way home. Just a delay in my last stop, but only 30 min or so.
Overall a fabulous weekend, made some new friends and saw a wonderful town. Thanks to my host Renia for making it so great.
As for Hamburg, im still continuously applying for internships, anxiously awaiting MBA decisions,
Erasmus Bridge
Very famous bridge in Rotterdam. Apparently there is a and enjoying my wonderful new gym. I have a busy month coming up, and I will try to blog as much as possible, but with Cologne this weekend, Rome for the majority of next week, and then my parents arrival, Austria, and then Rachel's arrival, a NYE trip to Prague, and then a seminar in Dresden for a week. PHEW. Yeah im tired just thinking about it, but I am very much looking forward to these trips :-).
Hope everyone is having a wonderful start to the xmas season. Wish you could all be here to experience the xmas markets. They are full of nice smells, good food, and cute gifts.
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