New Year 2010

It's the first week of the new year, and snowing!  I have spent much of my life in Florida and Los Angeles where snow is quite a rare thing.  The past two winters here were quite warm and snow was also an unusual occurance here in Alkmaar.  But now, glorious, beautiful snow! 

It makes travel rather difficult - I might have mentioned previously that they don't plow/shovel much more than the highways - and certainly not my neighborhood.  Some of the main roads have been closed lately because of ice, and public transportation has been having problems last month and this one.

Bicycles have been replaced with sleds - and it's so cute watching parents take their young children everywhere by sled.  Because it's flat land, it's easy to pull them along behind you.  Because people are used to travelling by bicycle to work, to school, to the market - weather doesn't bother them.  Rain, snow, wind, hot days or freezing ones, you dress comfortably, appropriately, and go.

I've been keeping up with my New Year's resolution - watching movies - and have been enjoying the nightly break from writing and studying.  I'll share a few photos from this past week, and hope everyone out there is safe, well and staying warm!

The new year started off with a bang!  Oud Jaar's Avond is the one time of year when all your neighbors can buy and set off fireworks.  The big cities all have organized celebrations, but it's more fun for me to try and pronounce "gelukkig nieuwjaar" after midnight and a couple shots of Jack Daniels.

This was the start of latest snowfall.  You can't see the road ahead, at least not very far.  From the tire tracks you can get an idea of how wide the road is.  There are canals on both sides, and this is a two way road.

Then it warmed up a little more, and everything began melting.

That night it froze, and ice formed under everything.

And it is snowing again right now!  It doesn't look so bad, but under that pretty white stuff is pure ice.

Somebody remind me to get snow boots...

Here's one of my favorite Dutch quotes: God created the world, but the Dutch created Holland.

Tot ziens!
 

Holidays in Holland 2009

Here it is, the end of another year already!  2009 was great - and I'm so looking forward to 2010.  My New Year's resolution is to watch one movie every (week)day next year.  I'm still in school, and I'm also finishing up a screenplay, so I thought approx. 260 films rather than 365 would be a good goal for a year.

With the help of friends and family I have put together a list of over 400 films released beginning with the 1930s until 2009.  It covers all genres, with slightly more comedy and action films due to my personal taste.  Some of the films I saw in the theater - although the nice thing about having a brain injury is that if enough time goes by, it's like you're seeing the movie all over again for the first time.

I'm really excited to finally see some of the classics that I've missed, or review films that I haven't seen since I got into the industry.  I notice different things now - I can get distracted by awkward lines, unusual camera shots or equally be amazed by acting so good you swear the person is the character in real life.

I wonder what I will learn about films and filmmaking by the end of next year.  I don't know how I'm going to choose what movie to watch on any given night. (Alphabetical?  By year?)  I'll be Twittering from time to time giving a short opinion on what I've seen.  But now, it's the last day of this year, and I know that I am so very grateful to everyone here.  This is such a beautiful country with really terrific people. 

Now, a few recent photos to share...

I got a new coat (thanks Mom!) just in time for the first snow.

The canal where I live with snow!  Hopefully, it will freeze up soon and I can try ice skating...

This is stamppot. 

Dutch food may not be the prettiest, but it sure does taste good!  This is also a good winter dish to keep you healthy and warm.

Another dish that maybe isn't so pretty - but is really delicious and healthy. 

Snert or Erwtensoep is Dutch pea soup.  Another perfect winter food.

The Dutch Christmas - Pakjesavond - with Sinterklaas is on the 5th of December.  Then a more American-style Christmas with Santa on the 25th and 26th of December.  Why two Christmas days?  Nobody knows...

Christmas candles

A little Christmas train. Look at the large version of this photo - like many things in the Netherlands, it's in English.  Although in real life, the Dutch use a French word for Police.  Why?  Nobody knows...

Another big thing here is fondue.  I don't anyone who had a turkey dinner planned for Xmas.  I love food, which is a reason why I love the holidays!

Food to nourish your body and soul.

And now that it's New Year's there's a special Dutch treat - Oliebollen!  I watched them being made, as my real help began by eating as many as I could.  I had four plain, and three with raisins.  Then my tummy hurt, but in a good way.  Here's the general process to make oliebollen...

Start with making the dough.  The Dutch have a trick for adding yeast - they just use beer.  If you want to buy "active yeast" you have to get it from a special store.  It's not like what the US has available in every supermarket.

The floors are heated, and the radiator also helps keep the dough warm so it rises.

Heat a big pot of oil.

Add balls of dough and cook...

...until golden brown.

Add powdered sugar (cinnamon sugar is good too!) and it tastes like you're eating a little bit of heaven.

Gelukkig NieuwJaar!

    

Motorcycle Tour Benelux (part II)

I'm going to try to keep this as simple as possible, since my Blogger is no longer working. I meant to put the rest of the photos and my comments in part I, but it's still so messed up, I can't even edit the post. Believe it or not, Twitter now seems much less complicated to figure out. Funny thing is, as soon as I figure out how a system works, they change it, give me an "upgrade" with the latest and greatest. Oh well.

Our bike.  Getting ready to leave Belgium for Germany and Luxembourg.

Our group leader, Allan.  Really nice guy.

Peter - one cute grandpa.  If of course you like the skull face.

Roos (or in English, Rose)

Us.  Tired, sweaty, dirty - like always.

There are windmills all over - not just in Holland.

This is what it's all about.  The Ardennes.  Forest occasionally interrupted by fields or villages.  Hairpin turns.  15% grades.  Most of the time I was just hanging on, enjoying the adventure.

It feels good!

:)

Motorcycle Tour Benelux

I'm back in school and winter is fast approaching so this may have been the last (long) trip on the motorcycle this season. We started out in the early morning last Friday and met our group leader, Allan, in Utrecht.

From there we rode down into Belgium to Boeles Place.  I've blogged about them before - it's my favorite biker place to go to.  Over the weekend we went to Luxembourg and Germany as well, before returning to Belgium and then finally the Netherlands.  I did my best to take photos - although it rained (and thus the camera was safe in my pocket) and some of the photos I was trying to take from a moving bike - which isn't as easy as it looks.

I wish I could add more details to the images - the scents of the Ardennes forest, the freshness of a field after a light rain, or the sounds in the little villages of Flemish, Dutch, French, German and English being spoken by natives and tourists alike.  I'm pretty sure everyone with a motorcycle was out riding - we saw scores of bikers in groups from all over.  A perfect long weekend, until the very end with the rain.

Jan & his wife Anne-Marie run Boeles Place - and the food is always awesome.  I discovered hand-made sausages with cheese inside them are my new favorite barbecue meat.  Your mouth just dances when you eat them.

This is Jan.  Behind him, like every good bar in this part of the world is a witch.  It's good luck, I think.  If I find a link to the story of exactly how this tradition started, I'll post it.

Bikers in Belgium. 

Games hard-core bikers play.  This is a new one for me with dice - and I totally lost - but enjoyed it.  I'm not sure what it's called.

Yeah, we're totally bad-ass with Uno.  But I did learn how to say the colors in Dutch. 

On our tour we stopped by a German motorcycle shop.  I thought this was cool for a couple of reasons - it's so neat and tidy, and the bike they are working on is for a disabled (paraplegic) rider.

This is his other bike.  Just thought that was neat.

We rode through tiny little villages and towns.

You have to watch that Saturday afternoon traffic in some places.  :)

We stopped for lunch in Germany - and as usual there was no sauerkraut (or wurst) to be found. So I had French food instead. Hey, it's all good to me.

As usual, I'm completely unable to manage my Blogger HTML. It's refusing to publish yet another post, or at least this time publish it correctly in tables and properly aligned/spaced. You have no idea how many blog drafts I have stuck in limbo. I suppose this is all for now. I'll try to post the rest of the photos later. :)

I just checked back and boy is my post screwed - the photos are overlapping or otherwise off the page somehow. You know what? Maybe I'll just continue blogging somewhere else. Anyone have a suggestions for a better place to blog than this one?

Part two has a couple of the photos I wanted to post here, and it looks a bit better than this one. I checked around and it seems there are several others having the same problem with their blogs at the moment. However, this is only an annoyance. The rest of life is working out well!