My first full day ...

Sunday morning biking in Groningen:
Liesbeth took me for a bike ride into the old city center this morning.  It's about a 15 minute bike ride to the city center from her home.  It is Sunday so the traffic was light.  Bikes have the right of way much of the time.  It was such a beautiful day, cool and sunny in the morning.




In the afternoon we picked up a friend and headed to Freylemaborg, a 17 century estate in a nearby town.  Liesbeth's brothers and their wives joined us.



After Freylamaborg we went to Liesbeth's brothers house for dinner.  It was so nice!  We started with real Dutch apple pie and coffee.  Then a little later they went out for Chinese take-out.  Liesbeth's brothers and family are so easy to get along with, funny and welcoming.  By the end of the evening I felt like I'd known them for years.  We even got to meet the new boyfreind of Liesbeth's great-niece.  He looked a little scared but I think he did OK.



It's been a very long day for me.  I've been up since 3:30am, it's 9:30pm now.  I'm going to stay up until at least 10pm and hope for a longer night sleep.  We actually go to work tomorrow.  I'm looking forward to seeing some of Liesbeth's school.

 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Saturday and Sunday ...

Image
This blog entry is going to cover the weekend, both Saturday and Sunday, and boy howdy, what a weekend it was ... We met up with a few of the other visiting colleagues and their hosts for a short drive to Bourtange, which is a very old village that started out as a fort.  Complete with a moat and drawbridges, except for modern things such as electricity, running water and nice toilettes, it's like a picture from a history book.  You can read some details about its history at Fort Bourtange  . We arrived and did a little walking around and then had coffee.  Then we did some shopping and more looking around.  The weather was amazing, and it has been mostly very good so far anyway, but it was sunny and cool.  This is a historic village, but it is also a real village where people live.  There was an old lady working in her garden, probably 85+ years old, and I just had to say hello.  With Liesbeth's help I introduced myself to her and t...
Read more

Friday holiday shopping before I leave Groningen

Image
So what happens after there's a national holiday on a Thursday?  You take Friday off of course.  This is a traditional four-day weekend in the Netherlands.  Schools, government offices and many businesses are closed both Thursday and Friday.  That means that today's Friday market in the city center of Groningen is full, like a Saturday says Liesbeth.  This is great for me because I get to see it all in action. Groningen is a great city of about 200,000.  It's a college town with lots of students, more than 50,000 college/university students.  It has a very old world feel in the city center, but of course has every modern convenience. Today we had kibbeling, which is small pieces of fried fish, very typical here.  Then I had to try poffertjes, which are a very traditional dough, made on a special cook-top, served with butter and powedered surger ... heel lekker! We really took it pretty easy today, especially since y...
Read more

Social Services in the Netherlands (an brief introduction)

Image
Refugees and asylum seekers in the Netherlands create a situation similar to the illegal immigrants in the U.S.  What is very interesting is that the sentiment towards these people is very similar to that of the US.  Surprisingly, here, the laws are very strict about who can come, stay, and seek special status as a refugee or asylum seeker.  In a nutshell, they are dealing with very similar challenges, but there are organizations that are helping with the situation, because it's more than the government can handle. Today we visited an organization that has the purpose of providing a "bed, bath and bread" to those who are waiting to hear if their application for asylum is granted by the government.  The program is called BBB+.  The director, John (in the pic above), is a very passionate man who is doing a great job leading the organization in providing dignaty and respect to people who are at a very low point in their lives. They are taking a very systema...
Read more