37b(k)

despite the fact that i didn't really do any 'traveling', december was a decidedly eventful month to end a most decidedly eventful year in the life of bk. the normal day-to-day things occurred as usual: dutch lessons continued, cappuccinos & biertjes consumed at de poort and various other locations around utrecht (but mostly de poort) and all of a sudden, the trees were bare owing to a little rain and a lot of wind. the mundane was, of course, spiced up by some significant events, the first being maren.

since arriving in utrecht, i had been looking for a decent french press or stove-top espresso maker. the dutch, it seems, run more to tea grannies than the coffee demons i am used to on the west coast. as such, the proliferation of tea pots, types of tea and various tea paraphernalia is somewhat staggering and far outweighs that of even the most basic of decent coffee requirements. they do have the standard range of electric coffee makers - which i despise - as well as an adequate selection of high-end espresso makers, but hardly anything by way of a good, reasonably-priced french press. at last, however, i managed to track down a proper bialletti stove-top espresso maker that didn't cost a small fortune. joy!

and then, i made the mistake of showing maren how to operate it. she, who had hitherto been used to the gentle caffiene of nescafe instant coffee supplemented by the relatively innocent cappuccinos of utrecht, was presented with an italian-style jet fuel available at all hours of the day and night and completely under her control. oops.

although maren was enjoying utrecht and her time here, she was still homesick and on the morning of 21 november, i awoke to a maren who had been up all night and had consumed 6 POTS of espresso - and would have had more if she had not run out of coffee grounds! please

note: each pot is the equivalent of 6 shots of espresso meaning she had consumed 36 shots of espresso in about 9 hours. by the time i woke up, her poor pupils were buzzing around in her irises and she had already booked a flight home departing that evening.

fortunately, she came back on 1 december and shortly after she arrived, her two friends alice and anna also arrived to spend the weekend with us and see kaizer's orchestra (a norwegian band playing at a club just up the street). unfortunately, the trip home didn't make her feel any better about staying in utrecht and on 5 december, she went home for good. that was a very sad day, but a nice one as well.

we went to de poort for coffee and tostis and after, finally climbed the dom toren to have a look around utrecht from on high. after the dom, we met up with our friend donna (from dutch class) for a pint and then i went with maren to schiphol to see her off :(

of course, i saw her again only a couple of weeks later when i was in sandnes for christmas. my first christmas in norway was very fun despite the fact that i was in some fairly excrutiating pain owing to a slipped disc that i suffered in my lower back shortly before i left for norway. i could barely walk and of course, i had booked the cheapest fare with klm which was thus non-changeable and non-refundable and although i begged, cried and otherwise pleaded with them, they would not change anything. no way, no how. the one concession they did give was that they had a golf cart waiting for me at schiphol to ferry me through schiphol and a wheelchair - complete with young viking to push it - waiting to receive me in stavanger. needless to say, when she came to pick me up at the airport, kari laughed without mercy as soon as she saw me sitting in the wheelchair. to add insult to injury, i caught a virus from casper on my second day at kari's house and was up all night hobbling between my bed and the bathroom. it was mercifully short-lived and all over within 24-hours but needless to say, i was far from a happy camper being basically confined to bed and having to take painkillers to get through both day and night.

but, i saw a physiotherapist who advised that movement is good and that i should try to get some exercise so i pushed myself to walk and was actually able to get to the mall for the last shopping day before christmas to finish my christmas shopping. it was not my finest hour in a mall though: i plotted my shopping attack based solely on a bench-to-bench strategy rather than a more prudent sale-to-sale or type-of-shop thinking. basically, if a shop had a bench nearby on which i could rest, that's where i would shop. or rather, hobble to the bench first for a short respite, then a brief foray into the shop to snatch at some goods and wait the interminable minutes for the lazy clerk to ring up the sale and wrap the gift, then back to the bench to to rest some more and spy out the next bench. i swear, i was this close to mugging an old dear for her walking frame! pride & vanity, of course, being the only things keeping me from it.

christmas eve - and present opening - was spent at anne-karin's and was extremely festive, as you might imagine. i thought casper would burst with the excitement! we were even blessed with a visit from a julenisse bearing gifts but unfortunately, casper must have been taking a nap or something because he missed the whole thing. maybe next year. [note: a nisse, or julenisse at christmas, is a typically norwegian creature (swedes call them tomtes). please see the wikipedia article for further description: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomte ] the visit of the julenisse was followed by yummy food, dancing around the tree and much present opening and general christmassy festiveness.

by the time i left sandnes, i was hobbling around pretty well (albeit with the narcotic assistance) so i flew to oslo to meet jonne and spend a few days driving back to holland for new year's eve. yes, at last, i have gotten to the new boyfriend. saving the best for last and all that. many of you have already heard rumors of him via conversations over the holidays but finally, here is photographic evidence. he may be as tall as bigfoot but he is infinitely more real and able to operate heavy machinery. or at least a volkswagen passat wagon.

we spent one night in oslo and set off for sweden the following morning which just happened to be an incredibly sunny, crispy and frosty day, full of white trees and complete with a thin layer of ice on the sea. unfortunately, no photographic evidence of this because i had stupidly left my camera in sandnes. we spent a couple of nights in southern sweden (gothenburg & växjö) and arrived at his cousin's house in groningen (in northern holland) late on 30 december. new year's eve was a fairly quiet evening in the countryside, peppered with a few explosive blasts of fireworks from the neighbor across the canal. quiet, that is, until midnight when the whole country exploded. greg & saskia had warned me that the dutch are mad for fireworks on new year's eve but even with forewarning, i was still unprepared for the full extent. and this was the quiet, sleepy dutch countryside! the entire sky was filled everywhere you looked and before long, the smoke & smell of fireworks enveloped the whole country. jonne and i took a walk to the end of the street to take a better look towards the town and i was absolutely terrified: drunken revellers all around us had explosive devices in one hand and lit lighters in the other. not exactly a winning combination. i'll admit that i was cowering behind jonne as i limped along the street, petrified that at any moment i would feel the burning sensation of a poorly-aimed roman candle up my backside. or perhaps it was well-aimed? hmmmm ...

i managed to emerge from the event unscathed and we headed back to utrecht the afternoon of new year's day at which time seasonal stress, long nights/short days, and homesickness finally conspired to get the better of me. ah well, nothing that a good cry and some nice chats with everyone back home didn't fix up in short order.

a couple of days later, i was back in oslo for a visit with tante lita who i hadn't seen over christmas because of my back. i also caught up with maren again who very kindly brought my camera with her from sandnes so i was able to take photos once again. i'm now back in utrecht and ready to take on 2007. but more on that later as i must dash to the shops to buy more toothpaste.

fyi, i am also uploading more photos to the photosite so check there soon.