10) Rotterdam

On Emily's birthday, March 3rd I went to Rotterdam with the international student union. They planned a day for us with many activities in Rotterdam
I was in Rotterdam in the summer with my mom when our cruise ship stopped there but got to see it in a different way this time.
The city was completely destroyed in WW2 except one church from the medieval city of Rotterdam was saved. So you can imagine if most of the other cities in Netherlands are dating back hundreds of years what a different outward appearance Rotterdam has being rebuild in the 1950's.
During the day we first visited the Protestant Church, Laurenskerk Rotterdam, which was build between 1449 and 1525. Then we went to the Cubic Houses. These houses are titled at 45 degrees and were built in 1984. I was so confused with how they would look inside from the outside but surprisingly they just feel like a small apartment when you are inside.
We also roamed around the market and my friends and I smelt pancakes and had to investigate. Turns out we found some pancake puffs. They are basically a heart attack in a little cute puff. Tastes like a fluffy pancake, soaked in butter, drenched in sugar powder, with chunks of butter thrown on top. Needless to say we shared one kid size portion between 3 people and walked a lot after.
We ended the day at very good Italian Restaurant called "Restaurant Happy Italy" in english, sometimes I love the literal translations...

How they cook the pancake puffs- That pot is full of butter, no joke. 

THE HEART ATTACK

No the camera is not tilted

View down from the sunroom of the cubic house.

Roof of the church 

Great day in Rotterdam!
Doei for now! more to come about March soon.
-XoXo

9) Den Haag

Hello again family and friends!
Sorry I have gotten behind again but I have had a very busy March and you will see why!
On March 1st I went on a field study with my Present Day Dutch Society class to Den Haag (in english The Hague) which is not the capital but where the Dutch parliament is.Our professor wanted to take us to all of her favourite sites as well as show us the Dutch parliament since at that time we were learning about their political system. Started the day by taking a 45minute train then the first stop was visiting the parliament. Bit of an interesting concept they have for the design on the building. Was re-done in 1992 to attach the original building to the newer building. We were allowed to go sit in on a debate, which would have been very interesting had I understood what they were going on about!
Then we went to the Peace Palace, the Panoramic Museum and Mauritshuis Museum where I got to see The  Girl with the Pearl Earring painting by Vermeer! Apparently they have closed the Museum or will be soon to do renovations and The Girl will be hiding for a couple years while that is being finished. Lucky timing for me! We also got to see the Royal Palace as the Netherlands has a Constitutional Monarchy and the current queen is Queen Beatrix. I always wondered why the colour orange was affiliated with the Netherlands since it is nowhere in their flag- I now know that the reason for orange is the royal family, the House of Orange- Nassau.
Ended the day by going to the beach! but brrrr it was not my kind of beach. Very foggy and COLD- but the area where the beach is would be lovely in warmer weather, hope to make a trip there in the coming months again.
Here are some photos!

The Prime Minister Mark Rutte's office

The famous view of The Hague 

Museum!

Royal Palace

My cool friends and I outside the Peace Palace... haha we thought we were pretty clever. 

can you see the ocean in the distance?

-XoXo

8) My hot ride... Verona

Been a very busy past week! I kept going to write my blog but then something new would come up. As the world knows transportation in the Netherlands means... bicycles! On average each dutch person owns 3-4 bikes. Ok now do the math for a country that has 17million inhabitants... that's a lot of bikes! I have one, her name is Verona (photos scroll down). When I first bought my bike I had a 3 month warranty included in the price and wow that has come in handy so far. I have had a few problems with my bike, one of them having the possibility to injure me badly. When I went into the bike shop the man looked at me, looked at my bike, looked at me and said " YOU HAVE BEEN RIDING THIS, LIKE THIS?"..hehe oops... yea so now I know that one stupid things people do is take the screws of the front wheel frame and so your wheel will just come off, not sure how this amuses people but now I know to look for the possibility of doing a face plant before I get on my bike. 

My hot ride... with pink flowers and two locks. 

I have heard some horror bike stories. There is a big problem with thieves stealing bikes and then selling them on the street for very cheap. It is illegal to buy a bike from these criminals but some people risk it as the bikes are very cheap, as cheap as €10...  Apparently in the first week a guy from the exchange program bought a bike from the street, then was arrested by the police but because it was after hours they did not want to deal with his paper work so they put him in prison for the night, poor guy! Then of course you hear about losing your bike keys and having to get your bike unlocked, not moving when you are peddling as fast as you can because the win is going against you, not being able to find your bike, o and the list goes on. Basically your bike is your best friend, and after seeing the car prices for the first time last week I know why bikes are more popular than cars! 

Where I am living there is very little car traffic. The central city centre of Utrecht is medieval and was not designed for automobiles so there are very few in the centre itself. I went for an adventure a bit closer to the highway and found a gas station. So here you go... no more complaining in Canada! 

That is in Euros remember ;) 




-Xoxo