clogs, windmills, and rain

musuem with Rembrandt

amsterdam

boat crusie in amsterdam. lots of house boats
the boardwalk in the hague. and where i went swimming
why do they make the spoons so small?
urinals. am i using it for real? that is the question
at the pottery place
me and ben

getting my hair played with by women = awesome


me and tanner lookin tough
flower seller
clog place
cheese factory
fishing village
windmills. never knew this but they help with pumping the water out so the netherlands, which 60% of it is below sea level, doesn't get flooded all the time.

the last two days have been pretty touristy, but fun. yesterday we spent the day in amsterdam, and don't worry it was in the good part of town. we went to the Rijksmuseum, which is known for its Rembrandt paintings. afterthat we went to a diamond place, a pottery place (don't remember what it is called but it is known for its blue pottery), took a boat cruise down the canals, and also went to Anne Franks house. Last night (and the night before), I, along with about 5-6 other people, took a 25 min. walk down to the coast of the north sea and took a swim. water was actually pretty nice and it has been a ton of fun.

today we left nice and early (7am) and went to the flower auction, which is housed in a building that covers over 250 football fields. after that we went to a clog making place, a cheese making place, saw a bunch of windmills, went to a fishing village in northern holland and ate some more haring (still gross) and spent the rest of the evening walking around near our hotel, eating dinner, and studyin up for class tomorrow. tomorrow we have our last corporate visit with Shell and their strategic planning branch, a few classes, then off to paris on wednesday.

the netherlands

utrecht (i think this is how you spell it)



raw haring with onions. quite the delicacy here in holland

eating at a pancake house for dinner
in utrecht
dinner in utrecht with marco, denny, and jan
playin soccer, i mean futbol. i had one of me playing but for some reason it wouldn't upload. but no worries, i'm awful at soccer.
random deer park here in oistervijk. i have no idea how they get these deer to stay inside the fence

in the fire station with our dutch friends




as you can probably tell, this uniform was way to small for me.
jan learning how to use chopsticks

US vs the Netherlands. as you can tell, we were gettin pretty bored waiting for our train

denny, jan, myself, and marco. overall a great day.

so i recently realized that I haven't updated this blog in quite some time. the last three weeks we have been in a conference center in oistervijk. during this time we have had class everyday (monday thru saturday) from 8:45 am to 12:15pm. the classes here, international trade and finance and global marketing, have been pretty interesting but at the same time, i'm glad they are over. in the course of these past three weeks, i have had 4 tests, one 6 page paper, a multitude of small assignments and article summaries, and a 30 minute presentation. but don't worry, it hasn't been all work and no play here. most days a group of us will get a ultimate frisbee game or soccer game going, which has been a great way to relieve stress and get some excercise in. another cool thing is we all have bikes here, which is great cause we have been able to tour around towna and see some of the neighboring town. the weather here is kinda funky. most days it has rained for part of the day, then been sunny and nice, but the last 3-4 days have been overcast and rainy. but due to the fact we have had two finals in the last two days, we've been quite busy studying and haven't been too distracted to go out side.

i think i mentioned this in a blog post before this trip, but in january, myself and my roommate and buddy, Denny, hosted a dutch student, Jan. Last week, our group visited his university in Ede, had a tour of the school along with some presentations, and then we went to a nearby town, Utrecht, for a city tour and dinner. what was sweet about all this is Jan was there and we were able to catch up with him and several other dutch students we had met. then this past tuesday, Jan and Marco met up with denny and I for the afternoon and evening. we hopped on multiple trains until we reached were jan works, which is at a firestation. after a quick tour of the station, we proceded to put on the uniforms and pose in front of the firetrucks (see photos above). after that we had chinese food and headed back to oistervijk. i think we were together from 1:30pm to 10:30pm and i'd say we spent about 6 of those hours on a train or in a train station. but it was cool to see the majority of western and southern holland in that time period and we had lots of time to catch up and stuff.

tomorrow we head out to the hague for a few days and amsterdam for one. after that paris for a few days (where we will finish up our final class days) and london for several days (where we will have our last final!!) then home on the 31st.