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Calling
Some time ago I fell sick. I woke up in the middle of the night with strong pain, and it wouldn’t go away, so we called emergency. Emergency asked me some questions about the pain, and told me to wait until the morning to go to a regular doctor (GP). So I waited, and it was hurting, and by 7.55 am I was already in front of the nearest doctor’s ( Read more... ) -
On life cycles
After a solemn promise (luckily, only to myself), to write more often this year, I’ve let almost half a year go by without writing a single line. Things have happened in this half a year, of which I haven’t written and probably will never write. Not only because it is private, but mainly because I feel I can’t find the words to properly explain or ( Read more... ) -
Happiness
Writing some work emails at 3 am (and knowing I need to get up at 6!), I just realized I was completely happy. Happy, because I was doing something interesting. Happy, because I was working on something meaningful. Happy, because there are beautiful things in my life, which have not taken full shape yet, but the anticipation alone is making me ( Read more... ) -
Freedom!!!
Just in case you have somehow missed my messages on Skype, Facebook, VKontakte or your mobile, here's the news: I finally graduated last week! The feeling of freedom has not completely dawned on me yet, what with all the work and social things planned long time ago for "asap after the thesis is done". But still, it's there, I'm free! To many of you ( Read more... ) -
3 years
July marked 3 years since I came to Holland. Three years. It’s hard to believe. The first semester in America seemed longer than these three years (the second one seemed like three months). U.S. was another planet. Holland has become, for better or worse, my second home ( Read more... ) -
Babylon
The amount of languages I use/am exposed to daily just keeps growing! As my Dutch improves, I speak more and more of it with colleagues... There's of course English as the international language, and then French which I speak to my French colleagues and friends. On top of that, there's Ukrainian (mainly spoken with Ukrainian friends living in ( Read more... ) -
Zlata Praha, or food as it should be & other impressions
As my next trip is not too far away, I better jot down the impressions from Prague now. Not sure if it is any use to most people reading this, as it seems that everyone from Russia/Ukraine has already been to Prague. Russian was definitely more useful than English in talking to locals in Prague. Russian speakers are probably the largest group of ( Read more... ) -
Water in a sieve
We are all stressed. Every day, we have tons of commitments to manage. Every day, we've got people calling us, asking us to do something, preferably "yesterday". We all complain about it. We get stressed, sometime we get burnouts, and we definitely need more holidays than we get, even if we get a lot. I notice myself becoming more and more part of ( Read more... ) -
On visas
Today I became a happy owner of a 2-year multiple-entry visa for the UK. It’s great to finally have a business reason to get a UK visa, because all those ads for 1 Euro flights from Eindhoven to London have been beckoning me for a while now.
Yes, I do need a visa for the UK. Yes, even though I have a Dutch residence permit. And yes, even though it’ ( Read more... )