spesshiiaaallll moments

I jst had my most special moment of the day.....

The entire day today has been peppered with amazing best wishes and birthday songs from all my friends and family, starting bright and early with a call from mum and dad. And i feel so special. It's my day. All mine. Took four long years but it's finally here.

I'm 7 years old today....well not technically....but yeah i'm 7. No more training wheels, license to ride a bike now. hahahahaha


and my most special moment? Nunu gave me a gift before i left South Africa with specific instructions that i could only open it on my birthday. And to make sure i did, she wrapped in about 5 times in case i had the urge to start opening it sooner which is pertty much how i am, impatient. hehehe
But i was good, i only gave in on one day. So today i had a good three or four wrappers to go through before getting to my present. and each layer of wrapping had a stunning new note from Nunu.


And the gift?....aawwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww i could've cried. the most stunning wallet from Guess. It's like she knew i needed a new wallet. Thank you my bestest friend in the whole wide world. Thank you. Mwah. Love ya

Now bring on the party...........

Euroshop 2008

On tuesday i went to Dusselfdorf for the day.....to be inspired by Euroshop.....which only comes around every four years....what luck that i'm in Europe.

dry your eyes...

I came home today with every intenetion of cleaning up the house and updating my blog with the happenings of the past few days. All happy and smiley and ready for tomm but i've decided to digress...

I was riding home from work today at around 6:45 pm and happy crossing this big-ass crossing....now the thing in Amsterdam is, when you crossing with your bike you sometimes have alot to cross over. So i was going from one side of the road to the bike lane on the opposite side. Two tram lines, and 2 single auto lanes, to get to the opposite bike lane. I was doing it all expertly and riding slowly so that i could join the bike lane at a gap.....and little did i realise that i was straightening out my bike too much, and my front wheel lodged straight into the tram tracks. And down i went, in a spectacular tumble that sprained my right hand to a pain unimaginable

Two people stopped to help me, they were so sweet, this guy saw it happen and turned his motorbike around to come back to help me, i was so embarrassed and in so much pain, i let them help me to the pavement and waved them off with a smile saying i'm fine.

Once at the pavement i help my hand in pain and i cried. I just bawled. and it wasn't just the pain or the bruised ego, I cried for everything, i finally got on my bike to ride home and i bawled all the way home, for life, for love, for dreams unrealised, for goals unfulfilled, for time lost. It was so strange, everything jst poured out of me....

now stupid me, finally gets done crying....and i head straight to the supermarket to get much needed groceries, only finally looking at my reflection in the store window, DAMN i looked like a mess.....hahahaha

Let the Celebration begin......

This weekend was awful. The studying...or rather my lack of studying had me stressed out. For some inexplicable reason, the stress gave me a terrible bout of homesickness. But i stuck it out and sat my butt down for some intense reading, which was about my only salvation by sunday, and I went through everything.

Funny thing is that only after stressing out over the exam did i finally start understanding the subject matter and i was able to contextualise it to some or other project that i had done before. I think that was the key to my final understanding.

I rushed over to Den Haag by train on Sunday evening and arrived around 10pm. Lili, Lebo and I went through once last paper, after dessert....which leads me to digress.....there is this dessert made here, yoghurt with chocolate bits in it, called Stracciatelli, it is simply DIVINE......oooohhhhhh yummy....yummy

Monday morning we arrived bright and early to begin our workshop series and to encourage the lecturers to let us write our exam earlier so that we could just get it over with. As luck would have it, we wrote around 3pm instead of 5pm.

And i'm proud to say, I passed!!! yayyyyyyyyy

Monday night's celebrations lasted from 6pm til 1:30am when we finally crashed on the couch....

Pictures are with one of the other guy's. I will get some..

I just can't get started.

I woke up late this morning, and spent the very-late morning, what was left of it, moving into my roommate's room (which is like THREE times the size of my room) and doing some general cleaning and washing up.
I even cleaned the fridge and stove.....I miss our domestic worker :-(

I'm supposed to have spent today studying for the exam!!! but I just couldn't get started no matter how hard i tried.

So I stopped trying....hahahaha and watched TV and skyped and sorted out some of my pictures.

And made a really REALLY yummy supper. Steak and salad....I think I should start Chronicles on my Food Experiments. I've been really having fun with it lately. Like the spicy rice i did last time and the pizza....ooooohhh and the crumbed fish stir fry I did last night....I even took pictures...hahaha

Crumbed Fish stirfry

















Steak and Salad with Goat's cheese and pumpkin seeds

longing for the homeland......

My bosses are going to Cape Town tomorrow. They going to spend a week in Mother City to attend the Design Indaba.

I can't say my heart isn't aching just a little bit.

yeah, homesickness....

gimme a sec....

ok the moment has passed.

Wonder what i should make for supper today......

This new-found love for cheese. It's so bad that last night all i had for supper was a cheese sandwich and i relished it. every last bite. i even took off one slice of bread coz i wanted to taste more of the cheese. what is happening to me????? uuuurrrrrgggghhhhhhhhhhh

Now lemme just explain, in case you are confused, I, Fehmida Osman-Latib, do hereby declare that I am loathe to cheese, but it is under particular circumstances and exceptions, i can eat feta, expecially when stuffed in a peppadew, i can eat fresh mozzarella on a slice of baguette with an olive oil, tomato and basil dressing, and i can eat melted cheese on pizza and in pasta dishes and fried haloumi...not plain haloumi......fried...it must be fried or grilled.
BUT.......... you know that cheese, the normal plain old cheddar and gouda, freshly grated and eaten just like that? It makes me schgrill just thinking about it. My stomach churns. I don't know what it is but plain cheese just turns my tummy.

But in Holland, they make this cheese, cheese peppered with cumin. and i mean it's LOADED with cumin, it's divine!!! yummy dot yummy dot com. I could eat it. On bread or a cracker or something of course. but oooooooooh it doesn't or rather it shouldn't be melted. plain on bread with some chilli, with polony, with a variety of things, any way you want, the cheese with komijn (cumin)......yummilicious.

Raindrops keep falling on my head...

ok it's official.......when it rains it SUCKS to ride your bike......

My glasses misted up....I could hardly see....the hood on my jacket refused to stay on.

My jeans got soaked,dripping wet....and my i-pod didn't wanna stay in my ear.

It was NOT fun.

And to top it all, just as i got home i decided i might as well stop at Albert Hijn (AH......or rather, Lebo and i say Aahhhhhhh)....it's the local brand of supermarkets....stocked like a Woolies food market but the prices of a Pick and Pay. It ROCKS!!!

Back to my story.....so i stopped at AH to do some grocery shopping...needed Juice and dishwasher liquid and some cheese (yes. oh horror of horrors, I'm developing a love for cheese!!!! still can't digest plain gouda and cheddar though, ewwwww bleh) ....and i filled the basket.....loaded up this BIG bag and reckoned yeah i'd load it on my bike and make it home.....

BEEEEEEGGGGGGG mistake. that was the toughest, most unbalanced trip home EVER!!! i will not be doing that again anytime soon.....I'll stick to using the tram when i need to shop.

....uuurrrrgggghhhhh Prince2 is killing me....

this Prince2 course......it's sooooo academic....it's driving me insane.....i can't seem to digest and understand it.....am i dyslexic or something? maybe it's just me.......the exam is in 5 days!!!!!!! I'm freaking out....i still can't remember half the terms used....or where it fits in the grand scheme of the project management organisation...

Prince2 Project Management is a B!t$h!!!

What a weekend.....

So this weekend saw some of the other South African buddies hopping over to Amsterdam from their towns and we decided to all meet up and have a jol.......

Friday night started off with a meet up with Eugene, Edward, Lebo and Nombuso at an Irish Pub off Dam Square to watch the SA Rugby team THRASH some other team......hahahaha i dunno the name.....and surprise surprise we landed up sitting right next to another south african......fun night....plus all our drinks got paid by the husband of a lady who works with Eugene....woohoo for the free colas.....hehehehehe

From there i rushed off to get dressed and go out with my roommate and her friends.....and wow....we had a great time.....after i finally found them....coz i left my bike at work i had to walk to where they were meeting and i got lost for an hour....ok maybe 2 hours...but i'm not telling....hehehehehe

It was good to meet up with Dutch people and we chatted for hours, Olile, one of the South African guys, joined me and we all landed up trodding home around 4am....what a good night...











Saturday we woke up late and went to explore the Albert Cuyp market again...for groceries and the like with Amelia and Olile.



met up with the girls (Lebo, Nombuso, Nolwandle and Amelia) for supper, or rather i HOSTED the girls for supper, made steak and chips...it was good stuff...and from there our walk into debauchery began.........lol.....we walked the red light district that night........we were done in about two hours.........too many tourists....many stunning girls in windows......and i saw ONE indian girl......hehehehe the nut in me got excited just coz i'd finally seen one indian girl among the other russian and dutch ones......lol.......nothing interesting to report.......and actually nothing really spectacular about the place........it's a hype maybe....

them hills.........explained

see........when I ride over them "hills"....huffing and puffing.......they aren't hills......yes I'm completely unfit and hopeless......they are the bridges over the canals.....hahahahahahaha

Ride 'em cowgirl!!!

Sooooooo it's been about four days.....ok ok it's been three days......that i've been riding my bike to work and back........and the verdict???

My butt is sore!!!!! damn those seats are soooooooooo not comfortable....and what happens when you wear hipsters????

hell.......bring out the longer jackets....thank god for my loooooonnnnnggggg jacket....it's perfect...but i've been the unfortunate witness to many a female showing me.....things i'd never wanna see......get a longer jacket dammit!!!!

and yes i'm STILL huffing and puffing over them hills....takes me sooooooo long.......and when i say hills......i'm honestly exaggerating the size of it...it's like a speed bump on steroids....not all that big...jst to go cross over the canal...but yeah i still huff and puff over them.....i'm so unfit... :-(

feels like that climb up table mountain all over again.......ok it's not as bad....but it's something similar.....lol

Weekend 2

This weekend we had a really good one....got invited to Nombuso's birthday party......and so Lebo and I got ready on Saturday and packed some overnight clothes and trekked to Den Haag for the party....we were psyked.....

so psyked...that we missed the Den Haag station and went all the way past Delft and were on our way to Rotterdam when the conductor came around to check tickets....and informed us of our huge boo-boo!!! hahahahahaha

so we had to get off at Rotterdam and catch the train back to Den Haag (The Hague).......lol......dumb blonde moments

anyway we made it from Den haag to Scheveningen....and this girl got put up in an apartment that's overlooking the beach and sidewalk!!!! oh my word..........the view is magical!!! it's astounding....it's soothing...it's incredible!!!!

and we were so lucky this weekend coz the sun came out and the temperature went all the way up to about 12 or 14 degrees....we had sunshine all weekend long........

The party was rocking..........even though i was completely buggered and could hardly keep my eyes opened

Stayed over at Sim and Lili's place...and i had such a good sleep on that couch....i was out like a light and didn't wake up til 10am......and then we all lazily got ready........to head back to Nombuso's place for that view before heading home to Amsterdam...hehehe...

we landed up having lunch and chillin at Nombu's place til about 4pm........the view from her balcony was mesmerising......

but the funniest FUNNIEST part of the weekend.....was starting at the boardwalk and the beach from Nombu's balcony...it was PACKED with people on Sunday.....all thinkly wrapped in their winter jackets and boots and gloves...but EVERYONE was at the beach, walking around, playing in the sand, with their cooler bags, etc. etc.......did i mention they were all wrapped up in winter clothing??? hehehehehehe it was like Durbs in December........ :-)

Paradiso

sooooooooooo we planned to go to Paradiso last night.......made plans with Celeste, Francois and Lebo that they would all meet up at my apartment, we'd have supper and then move on to the party......

everyone arrived around 7pm and we ate pizzas and chips and chatted til late.......and around 10:20pm we decided right, that's the perfect time to head off to Paradiso for a good night of partying....i mean the clubs in SA are good to hit at aournd 11pm right? i mean really.....gosh i even msholozi'd my noombies...and got all dressed up for it....

So we excitedly arrive at Paradiso after a tram ride and a nice long walk later......and everyone is LEAVING.....they are LEAVING????!!!!!!!! i mean WHAT THE HELL was going on???? they were all getting dressed up in their jackets and leaving.....i'm still trying to digest it....they were leaving.......we asked the people that were leaving what's going....so this one kid was so funny......he said well the act is over...and we said well it's only supposed to start at 9pm....and he smugly looks at his watch and says....welll...it's 11pm now....duh....and we were flabbergasted!!!!!

in retrospect it's extermely funny....but in the moment......we were highly unimpressed........a fabulous evening with the strongest crudest mix up in between.....

so we went to chill in stead and then headed home...and while walking home we witnessed an uuuuuuugggggglllllyyyyy bicycle accident.....this lady was riding happily long (i think she was a little bit LOT drunk) and she kissed the kerb so hard, she pulled back skin and gashed her chin....there was blood everywhere....so we went to help her...but some local dutch people got to her first....so we watched and offered help...but we were not needed so we left.......most surprising happening of the evening............the people who were helping the "fallen" lady....didn't call the ambulance...they were calling Tom, Dick and her pet dog before calling the ambulance!!!! madness!!!!

tonight's plans.......

woohoo!!!!....Lebo has been placed for an internship in a company in Amsterdam as well and her hot colleague that she works with....has a girlfriend that's a bouncer at one of the seriously happening clubs in Amsterdam......PARADISO.....so we've been duly hooked up with a couple of tickets for the booty-shaking, floor-hopping, fantastic party that's rocking on there tonight............YEAAAAAHHHHHHHH!!!!!

nerves....

So i had my big meeting with the people at my company today..outlining some objectives.....i was soooooooo nervous.....as always.....and it went off brilliantly....i wonder if i can ask them to offer me a job instead....that'll be awesome!!!

hmmmmm

i lurvvvvvv the convenience of the stores here.......1 minute rice??!! that's the best.....used it to make this yummy spicy rice the other day...i was duly impressed with myself.....maybe i should start posting my alternative recipes for Amsterdam....hehehehehe

and i made pizza yesterday....was sooooo yummy......one pre-prepared pizza base, squirt on some Heinz Hot tomato ketchup, spread......lay some slices of cheese.....cut polony into slices and halve, layer to pizza, slice up feta-stuffed hot peppers, layer around, slice up fresh green chilli....sprinkle over.....and you can then add like a million things, onions, peppers, whatever you want....none of which i was in the mood to add....top it off with a bit more cheese....sprinkle the dried coriander and origanum.......some fresh ground black pepper and pop it into a hot oven

voila....yummy dot yummy......and yes i have a picture....woohoo...but i can't load it yet...will do it tonight....i hope

takes some adjusting

it's really strange....we are so conditioned in south africa to be on the lookout all the time......alert....aware of what's going on....who's where.....and though we do the same automatically overseas....which is not necessarily a bad thing.....we need to swithc it off sometimes....is there a plug? can we?

some background...i come from a home where there's noise all the time....the occasional bouts of quiet or rather ALONE time in the house is if everyone goes away on holiday and i stay home...the best times...for a weekend usually....

but now that i'm in Amsterdam...i go home everyday like in normal life to an empty, quiet apartment and it's a bit unnerving...yes i can switch the stereo on and the tv on and that means noise...but it's not about the noise...it's about occupation........the space.....or the emptiness....

I can feel that i'm alone on the place..and i'm almost expecting there to be some psycho-housebreaker hiding in the bathroom or one of the rooms...or somewhere i can't see....and i'm almost weary of every little creak and sound in the house....

maybe time will help me get used to it......

the wheels on the bike.....

hmmmmmm them bikes....hehehehehehehe......Fehmz like an idiot....tells her company coach today that maybe it's time to get a bike so we go to the bike hire place and voila i've got wheels.....uhm....yeah so in Amsterdam where everyone is organised and in a hurry and knows EXACTLY where the paths are and where they are going and which lanes are for what and which traffic lights to focus on and what the heck to do all the time........not so easy, for the person who knows little of these procedures....silly me.......hectic ride....hectic.....but after a few u-turns for being on the wrong side of the road and huffing and puffing over the canals....i finally made it home without any major incident.....

.........and out of nowhere....murphy's law came to bite me in the ass.......and i fell....bike and all into a pile of scaffolding about 5 steps away from the front door to my apartment building......not pretty................as if my toushie wasn't already in pain from the ride and my fingers frozen to death....................now i got bumps and bruises to nurse as well and not to mention a wounded ego......

Decided to walk home from work......

I decided to walk home from work yesterday.....it was fun....however i got halfway (40 minutes later) and was finally way too cold (4 degrees celcius and lower).........so i stopped for supper at my "now" favourite arabian shoarma (shawarma) uncle...and caught the tram home.....maybe i'll make it ALL the way home today.....just maybe

Sunday 03/02/2008

I was finally a tourist today.......

I took a walk from my apartment in Minervaplein to Museumplien and spent a good few hours in the Rijksmuseum and the Van Gogh Museum. It was inspiring and breathtaking to see the masterpieces of Vincent van Gogh, Rembrant van Rijn and Johannes Vermeer.......



Met vriendelijke groete, Fehmz

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!!!!!

oh my word!!!! there's MICE in the apartment......two arrogant buggers!!!!!! word!!!! i'm not gonna be able to sleep now....they freaking me out....how do i kill them????!!! help me....... *sniff* *sniff*

Saturday 02/02/2008

Woke up late today after a very late night.........we went to a BNO function. BNO is a Dutch organisation for Designers. It was in beautiful building on the harbour and if it wasn't raining outside i would've gotten a picture.....sorry

Anyway we proceeded from there at midnight to a place called BitterZoet (sic) and only left around 3am, i think. It was fabulous, they played reggae all night....

And since the trams don't run after midnight, i couldn't get home so we just crashed at a friend's place til the tram line started running again, went home bleary eyed and hit the sack for a good few hours of rest.

Spent the rest of the day at Albert Cuyp Market buying items for the apartment...and surprise surprise....i found ALL the indian spices i needed......at a local shop.....couldn't find an indian shop for the life of me....all the indians are running souvenir stores or something....i was pleasantly surprised....clearly...hehehehehe






And after many enquiries with the local muslims i was quite despondent because they all could not tell me where to buy "halaal meat" or find a "halaal butcher" even at one muslim take-away.....so i was about to give up when i decided to walk into a shoarma shop that i had been eye-ing for a couple of days......and........woohoo!!!!! the uncle was soooooo awesome, he directed me to the butcher which was literally under my nose...and i found it all....yayyyyy......and he also explained that the reason no-one understood me is because they do not recognise the word "butcher".....it's commonly known as Slaggerij....

riding on the high of finding this butcher....i went home and happily un-packed the groceries and filled the fridge..... :-)

p.s...the image uploader thingamajig is not working.....Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

First week flies by

So our first week was spent in workshops and training and studying......boring and mind-numbing and we were given a mammoth task to complete over the two months of our internship as well as being reminded that we will be writing exams in three weeks and we shouldn't forget to study.....

Needless to say by Tuesday I was gatvol and just wanted to get on with the actual internship, staying in a hotel was beginning to drive me a little bonkerz. :-p

and finally on Wednesday morning last week, we had our final fun briefing and off we we were to all our different destinations....lucky me, came to Amsterdam.

I didn't quite explore too much yet but Thursday and Friday was spent at my new work......it's called OPERA and they do Graphic, Multimedia and 3Ddesign....woohoo!!!! it was a fabulous first week

I'm a little bit....okay maybe alot intimidated for some weird reason so i've been very quite....surprising considering I usually can't seem to shut up....hahaha

Go see the company's website - www.opera-ontwerpers.nl

Finally......

So i finally decided to start a proper blog about my happenings in and around Amsterdam during my two month internship......yayyyy

Maybe a quick catch up session is in order.......

I arrived in Holland last week Wednesday after much anticipation and some preparation for a two month internship in Holland. The internship takes the form of in-house work for a design firm as well as a course in Project Management (Prince2 to be precise)........of which an exam will be written.......yes it is sponsored.....I applied in the South African newspaper for the opportunity to be part of this learnership and was one of the lucky 42 to be accepted......

Anyway......we arrived last week in Den Haag.....more commonly known as The Hague and where the international criminal courts and tribunals are held, it is also the city that houses the Netherlands Parliarment as well as the Queen's residence and basically almost all the International Embassies, including our very own South African embassy and consulate, where we were fortunate enough to meet with our South African Ambassador to the Netherlands who managed to catch us singing the tail-end of Nkosi-sikeleli Afrika.

Hardly much time was had in Den Haag to tour properly but we managed to make a couple trips out at night to walk around the city and check it out.....very interesting mix of new and modern buildings. The business hours run much like South Africa where all the stores close at 5pm but the nice thing is that on a Thursday evening most of the stores are open til 8pm or 10pm to accommodate the working people.

One night a bunch of us went out to a very cheesy, absolutely insane karaoke bar where we had an unforgettable evening of laughing and singing....definitely one of the most memorable nights in Den Haag.

We were staying in a very nice Hotel call NH Hotel. I'd recommend it to anyone however after a week I was certainly sick and tired of being in a hotel and couldn't wait to get to Amsterdam and the apartment I was to stay in for the rest of my two month period.

The weather - It's winter in the Netherlands and I honestly did not expect the winter to be this cold....but I'm slowly getting used to it. After a few days you begin to get aclimatised, it's still freezing cold, you can just handle it better and work with it.....

That's about all I can think of to say today.........more catching up will be done on Monday if possible.........and yes i will definitely get some pictures to post up very soon...........

Met vriendelike groete

Fehmz