DutchInLaw

Happy Meal, Michael Buble on the radio- "...and I'm feelin' good." I'm currently perched up in the second floor of Macdo's, watching the world go by. A few blocks away is the humanitarian office where I start work today. Tomorrow, starting at the refugee office. Even if both are volunteer jobs, they sound overwhelmingly my style. PR and communication work, carrying my camera and notepad around, and making a difference. "Op mijn lijf geschreven" as they say here. Obviously no high salary, just volunteers' recompense, but cool work, I think. And maybe next year I'll find a paying job that is just as cool. I'm curious about all the different things I'll be learning; refugee events, anti-poverty meetings, community videos. Fascinating to be able to make a difference in this region, in ways I couldn't have seen a year ago. My experience and portfolio are def going to grow along the way. The fact that I can bike to work here is also a...

Today was the day I chose for the first half of the NT2 exam. Partly because it fit conveniently in an agenda full of other events like job interviews, weekends, and a friend's wedding. Partly because it was my own anniversary! It seemed fitting to celebrate my (Dutch) marriage with a Dutch exam that would bring me one step closer to belonging here. Back in the winter I decided for sure I wanted to take this big exam. The NT2 is short for  Nederlands als tweede taal , meaning Dutch as a second language (not that it was my second - I think it was my fourth or fifth.) I was already at a decent level of Dutch, but it was time to go for something more. Choosing the NT2 was practical - I have to pass some language or inburgering exam with 3.5 years of moving here, if I intend to stay. At 90 euros for the exam itself, it was also surprisingly inexpensive (at least, compared to the hundreds we have to pay for my residency permit.) Last but definitely not least, I knew studyin...

If you have to be unemployed, try to make sure it's during the summer. For one (major) thing, you can leisurely soak up the sun while reading "How To Find A Job" articles. If you're jobless in the winter, you can hunch over a library table and glare at the same articles with rain pouring down outside. In the summer, you can waltz around your house in a Tshirt and shorts while vacuuming and musing over job opportunities, instead of stamping from bedroom to kitchen to living room in search of a warm den, conducive to pondering.  At the end of the day, though, you're still jobless. So I'd advise a compromise: get a job at least before the winter. In the summer, don't wallow in boredom or laziness. Search for jobs, take fun courses and helpful quizzes. In other words, enjoy being on the lookout from your deck chair, if you can.

<p>Today was photo day. I never had a cute collection of yearly school photos, and I think the last adorable-child-smiling-against-a-vague-studio-background was when I was 7.</p> <p>Over the last few years, though, I have more than made up for this tragedy. Bus passes, drivers' licenses, residency permits and passports in various countries. Nearly all of them with that oh-so-restrictive rule, "Please do not smile." Hmph. Thanks to America's Next Top Model, I know how to "smile with eyes only," which means that, A, my photos turn out acceptably rule-following to be put in official documents, and, B, I don't look emo. Or "Oh oh you just took my photo when I was absent-mindedly thinking of something else,"which happens pretty often. In any case, the photos today turned out nice. I walked out of the store, checked again in surprise, and then attached the photo to the four pages of residency paperwork I had with me. Then sealed...

Last year I waited anxiously to hear if I would get a residence permit. The backup plan was to quickly pack my suitcase and leave for a friend's house in the UK. After months of waiting, I finally got the oh-so-precious letter saying I was granted residency for a year. Celebrations all around, jubilant skype conversations, and even pastries from my parents in law! Thanks to bureaucracy, I received that letter in November, informing me that the year I was granted began... in September. I was grateful that I had my permit and could stay with my husband in our new apartment, so I wasn't going to call and complain. We eventually looked up how soon I'd have to reapply: three months before expiry. Which means tonight, six months after getting my permit, I need to sit down and apply for my next. They did send the whole packet of materials to our house, unasked, so that makes it really convenient. Unless, of course, we choose to grumble about needing to go get new, "previous...

After a very long, wet winter-spring, how thrilling to join the ranks of Dutch Housekeepers and hang my laundry outside. White duvets and linens blossom from balconies in a mass embrace the sunshine and wind. Hopeful loads of fluffy winter sweaters are crammed onto clothes rack before being packed away. Small children run outside to play, thankful for the sudden release from conscription in the rainstorm sentries corps. For these few, happy hours, man and nature are at peace. At least until the winds pick up and threaten to gift my downstairs neighbors with the zebra striped pair of socks that I neglected to securely clothes-pin.

<p>Out to eat tonight with the tech team frm church. Some older, some younger. I'm the only girl on the team at the moment, though last year there was another one. Actually, she ran sound for my wedding, which made me happy. Female techies are pretty rare, but the few that I know are cool. I think it comes with the job.... For one thing, techies tend to have a quirky kind of humour. There are always things to notice and quietly chuckle at, preferrably with another techie or two. From the remote (sometimes even soundproof) tech booth, you have a great view of fidgety kids, accidents on stage, and other workers. Then there's independence. As a techie, you have to be able "to keep your head when everyone else is losing theirs and blaming it on you," (Kipling). If a server crashes or microphone dies, you have to fix it. Now, or sooner. Even if you're lucky enough to work in a team you're still responsible for your part. Judging from the amount of introvert...

It has been a long day and a longer spring. Learning a language in a foreign country is in no way a rarity these days. Nor is looking for a job in that foreign country. Nor is being a newlywed and building a new life with a new family and new friends in that language in that country. Even though I know perfectly well that none of this is unusual, I found myself crying on my husband's shoulder today about all the above. Which, unfortunately, is not unusual either. Instead of reminding me calmly that none of the above is deadly, or permanent, he said an oddly comforting thing. "I'm impressed that it's taken this long for you to be like this." And I felt better. Just one more reason for me to love my husband. He said a few more things, like a reminder that I have been through a lot of major changes in the last year, and he knows how it feels to not have a purpose in your days. But it was that one comment that stuck with me the most. Even though it feels like I...

Keyboard. Drums. Guitar. Bass Guitar. Singers. Check. Now, the tricky part. Making it all sound good.  I sit in the back of the hall, checking the sound system. Each element on stage plays its own part; harmony, melody, undertones, rhythm. The spotlights catch the faces and the instruments, but what's hidden is my concern. No matter how beautifully the stage is set up, if the sound isn't right, listeners will hear one big chaotic mess.  I put on headphones and start moving the sliders. The singers - her voice needs to be clearer, his louder. The guitars are too heavy and distracting from the delicate piano. It's not a competition on stage - it's a cooperation. Another techie friend motions to me to check the speakers onstage. Delicately I adjust the keys and buttons until the front of the room pours out sweetness and power, mixed in the right proportions. Maybe the audience won't notice any difference, and maybe even the musicians and soloists will ...

Definitely a Dutch treat. I remember going to the mountains with friends when I was a kid and being introduced to this deliciousness. Poffertjes are essentially miniature pancakes, usually topped with powdered (caster) sugar. When I moved to the Netherlands last year, one of the gifts in my "welcome basket" was a poffertjes pan - a frying pan with little dimples to pour the batter into. Also in the basket was a packet of poffertjes mix! My then-fiance (now husband) and I stood over the stove for about an hour one night and made the whole batch. Between all the batter drips, laughing, and mistakes, we ended up with a pretty good amount of the tasty little things. This week I made my own mix from a recipe I found online, and made a new batch with my mum. Eet smakelijk!

New smartphone. Whole new era,as it were. On the go, here I am, riding the lift, shopping at albert heijn, biking in my city. Most excellent.

Toronto, Canada. Airport to an old-new-favourite world.

The sun is rising, and Rotterdam is glowing. So is Delft, and so is Den Haag - all visible from where we live in a panorama sort of world. The clouds put on a pink and purple party last night and then again this morning... people think of autumn as having red and gold colours but the sky seems to opt for pastels an awful lot. At least the stunning view out my window is only marginally blocked by racks of drying clothes.... Airing clothes is fine with me, but when it's wet outside it takes a pair of jeans about 24 hrs to dry it's not a pretty sight (plus sometimes the dampness just stays and smells. Not cool.) At least once it gets colder there will be central heating and that should help. Ahhhh- the thought of sitting next to a piping hot radiator. So much cosier than the impersonal air vent system working through a ceiling. I can remember curling up on a warmed floor in Greece as a kid - there the heating often comes through the tiles as well. A big heap of warm robes and swe...

So many other things to do - practice Taekwando, clean house, e-mail family members spread across the world, get ready for lunch at the school I volunteer at... and instead I'm playing with my plants again. Went out to water my geraniums this morning (the ones we 'live behind') and stopped to pull out some of the old growth... 20 minutes later I finished with the plants inside the house too, thinking busily. I pulled out handfuls and handfuls of yellowed leaves and old blossoms from plants that looked otherwise so healthy... how much is that like my life? Weeds are pretty obvious - they don't belong in plant pots or in life. Rude comments, bad behaviour. Fairly easy to see in yourself, not to mention that other people tend to point them out too :P ) But what about the tiny tiny little things? The little darting thoughts like, " I have so much more style than she does" or an extra 15 minutes wasted on a random Web site or impatience with how long it takes to...

The elderly lady in the elevator with me trailed off, then finished, "Nou, ja, zo gaat het." So it goes. I nodded and added a sympathetic "Helaas," back. She said she'd lived in our apartment building about 14 years. I'd guess she was in her sixties or seventies, and could picture her moving in with her husband, making a home here. We talked about how beautiful the view is from up high... maybe she and he sat on their balcony and drank coffee together, the way D and I do. Maybe they had hanging plants to substitute for the beautiful gardens in their previous house. It's rare to see a bare garden here, much less a messy one; block after block of houses overflow with flowers or are neatly tiled and decorated. I found six beautiful pink geranium plants in the dumpster room downstairs the other day, and brought them upstairs to be repotted and talked to. D laughed and asked if we "achter de geraniums wonen" - if we "live behind the geranium...

I looked around me as I walked, thinking about what to write. How do you put images, smells, and feelings into words? Especially random, disconnected moments in days like that one. Above me in an apartment building, two women in Muslim headscarves sat on a balcony and watched the world - the calm, sunny for the moment, world in the Netherlands. How many thousands of kilometers from home are they? Or have their families lived here for generations. Next to them sat a solid 'quad'- a four wheeled road-ready vehicle. What a picture that would have made, but I didn't have my camera with me. I kept walking. Bikers in tight-fitting spandex - 'snelfietsers' - passed me by. One, paused to check his bike, smiled at me; a girl in rolled up jeans and a tank top, who decided on a whim that the day was too pretty to waste and was walking the 9 kilometers home from her parents-in-law. Her Dutch parents-in-law. Her own parents were hundreds of kilometers and an ocean away, no...