We're Here!!!


Hello all, we're here! Maggie and I are doing very, very fine here so please don't worry for us. In fact, we're enjoying it very much and living it up!


It's only been Day 3 in the Netherlands & Day 2 at the hospital but we're feeling very much at home! Everyone here has been extremely hospitable & we feel warm, safe & happy :)


I've got very pretty pictures in my camera but we're in the hospital right now so I can't upload them! It's a pity, I would love to show them to all of you ASAP!


We haven't even been to any tourist-y places but we've been fascinated all the same! It's just the way of life here that's so different, so pretty :) It's a small city here & we really see things like those in the movies!


Quiet, small neighbourhoods, lush green grass, pretty flowers (and bees!). What we call a "picnic" in the garden (not a public garden, a real garden behind a house!!!) under the sun with some wine and toast is what we had at the Professor's house which had a gorgeous garden! Pictures will be posted later :)


The weather's been mostly great, sunny but cooling (about 20 degrees)! It's been raining sometimes tho, but mostly it's been great!


Well, probably the only 2 bad things I can think of that has happened so far is that I sort of fell from a bike the first day cos the Dutch bikes are SO tall and solid heavy! I'm fine, just a scraped knee. Most people get around the city on bikes so we're trying to do the same but well....



Fortunately we were practising in the garden only but unfortunately, we were pretty bad at it. So we've been taking the bus :( We're going back to practise again today.


The 2nd thing was that we got lost yesterday for about an hour in the RAIN! Yeah, it was cold and we were kind of miserable & scared. BUT, the Dutch people are really helpful so it all went well and we're glad we got the chance to see for ourselves the friendliness of the Dutch people! I guess it's kindda a good thing because we were forced to open our mouths to ASK for help. We'd be too shy otherwise.


And if even the Dutch strangers are so helpful, even more so our friends over here! Professor Uges has been a GREAT host, really going out of his way to make us comfortable. And he's even paying for almost everything here - our food, accomodation and buscards! We're extremely touched by his hospitality and generosity and we're sad we can't reciprocate much at all :(


The house we're staying at is beautiful & so is its owner (winks at Tessa: I know you'll be reading this :) ) & so it its co-owner (Svea, Tessa's Labrador) . Our room is beautiful and we're very well taken care of by Tessa too! It's been great really, we feel totally at home (it's our 3rd day!)


Okay, that's it! I could go on for hours but I'll let the pictures paint their thousand words. More later :) Take care all!

Last post from Singapore!!!

Dear all,


I have decided not to bring my laptop because you heartless people............ have refused to comment on my site! (Sorry Eu, I deleted the post that you commented on. Hehehe.) I don't want to blog already!!! +stomp stomp+


No lah, my haversack's too heavy already, I don't wanna put another 2kg stone in with a $2000 risk. So... I may not be able to blog as regulary as I was intending to (I'm sure there'll still be computers though) .


Flying in 12 hours time, now I'm more or less packed. Just need to go for my haircut at noon, get some Clarinase, Ventolin, Vit C and I'm ready to go.


Didn't really sleep well last night, I guess it's the pre-trip blues as usual. My constant worries about not packing enough disposable underwear and just the prospect of missing home. Thank God mum helped me squeeze all the stuff into my luggage too.


People, I will miss you. Yah lah, I know it's only 6 weeks but STILL!!!!! Some special shoutouts:



HAMLET: I will be back soon and we shall have our KTV!!! Arghhh. (P.S. Liyun & Ting: You were the heartless people I was refering to just now. You were supposed to say you'll miss me in my blog!)

Claudia: God bless you, I wish you success and much much more importantly, happiness, in Shanghai.

Fadhly: God bless you too, I wish you fulfilment & that you'll finally find what you love to do (and that HOT BABE to boot!!!!!!!!) Take care in Sydney!

FAMILY: Well, actually I haven't told you all about the blog address yet :P . Will do so later. Take care and I'll miss you all and home-cooked food!!!

Sarah: Thanks darling for helping me with the nerdy stuff. Who else could I trust more.

New-found friends at Janssen: Work hard for your presentations and have fun!!! I definitely miss spending time with you guys at work!



Aye... that's about it. The next time I'll be posting, I'll be truly HOLLERS from HOLLAND :)

The Pre-Departure Frenzy

I've checked in for my flight! Internet check-in of course, it's still 28 hours to my flight. I kinnda like the KLM internet check-in feature, except for that I had troubles printing my boarding pass both from my laptop & desktop, so that's left for tomorrow.

I had this minor panic attack yesterday when Maggie said, "Do you realize the next time I'm seeing you, we'll be in Holland already?"

Gosh, I definitely didn't realize. I am unsettled about taking such a long flight on my own, I've never done it before. Then again, foget the long-flight-part, I've never even flown alone before. Oh shit.

To further add to that, I finally emerged from that state of denial that "I HAVE ALOT OF TIME LEFT TO PACK" yesterday afternoon. I wanted to start packing on Tuesday but my family got hit by the idiotic stomach flu bug, all I did on Tues and Weds was puke, sleep & watch tv while waiting for the next puke urge.

When I next woke up, it was already Thursday and I hadn't packed at all.

and ....

Thank goodness for OUTSOURCING!

When I was buying travel insurance online last night I saw that my debit card expires 08/07! It was yet another "oh shit" discovery. I'd booked a couple of hostels for August with that card --- If it expires 31 Aug, fine... if it's 1st Aug--- DIE no place to stay already. Hahaha.

Yeah, so it was 10pm or so and luckily the DBS website says customer service is 24 hrs so I called & +phew+ it's 31Aug :)

And this morning I woke up (almost with a jolt) and remembered that I hadn't activated my roaming service! It was 7am. But having great faith in outsourcing and that my call would probably be answered by someone miles away where it was working hours (or maybe not but who cares) , I just called 1626 anyway. And it worked! Got it activated :)

So there, outsourcing is cheap and it makes me happy too :) (btw, the operators had nice funny accents, Filipino or something? I quite liked them!)

Thank goodness for Maggie

Thank you so much for buying all the ESSENTIALS that we need, raincoat and all!

And this pouch!

Maggie bought this cos Europe isn't really safe especially at the railstations but I started using it early in Singapore! I didn't have the time (and was too lazy) to make 2 trips so I went to the money changer with 3000 SGD, had it changed, and then went last-minute shopping.

It felt really safe! I definitely wouldn't have done any shopping without it and gone straight home. I was carrying this huge watsons bag of pads & disposable underwear & toiletries, plus takeaway lunch for my brother and me, plus an umbrella in the hot sun I would so totally have been robbed (not in Singapore actually) hehehe.

Alright I have to go, more things to do!!!!!

So many things to do!!!

I have so many things to do before I fly! I am SO glad that my internship ended earlier or I'll be so short of time.

I realize how tired I've been. I've had no problems sleeping for 11 hours and then napping for 3,4 hours in the day these two days.

This is me when I just wake up:

Well anyway, I bought a medium-sized haversack on Saturday. I figured there was no way I'm gonna be able to lift my monster suitcase to the overhead compartments on the trains. I'm gonna split my load into this havesack and a medium-sized suitcase instead.

patho textbook to show relative size!

The last time i brought my sis's 60L macpac haversack to Laos I nearly died. It's just way too heavy for me, I could barely walk the length of a soccer field. The large trolley luggage is nice to pull along but a total nightmare where stairs were concerned.

Well, I guess this will come in handy for our weekend trips to Amsterdam and Belgium too! Oh and it's water-proof! Important because Tessa says it's been raining 60% of the time in Groningen!

I've been good today!! I packed my room, cleaned the cupboards and tables (with Dettol too!!) and sniffed like a leaky tap thanks to the piles of dust. +pfffft+ I've also FINISHED the 2000-word preceptorship report. I almost feel saintly : ) +beams+

P.S. I'll be turning on the comments soon so feel free to tag!

Accomodation, check! Rail passes, check!

Went to j3travel at china square central on Saturday to collect our rail passes! Guess how much our passes cost? SGD659!!!! And that's not even including our reservation charges, which is about SGD30+ per reservation for a seat, for those trips that we need to reserve.

prague excursion pass (top) & eurail benelux + germany pass (bottom)

we got the 10 days germany + benelux pass that should serve us pretty well! By the way, Benelux counts as one coutry in Eurail. It comprises Belgium, the Netherlands & Luxembourg!

fortunately, the prague pass works out for us because it borders Germany :D

our nifty instruction manuals, guides & train timetables!

Oh yes, we can actually get these Eurail souveniors by filling in some survey! I love the Eurail dual-time clock! I'm so totally gonna fill them up after our trip :) Hee! So 'auntie' right!

the piece of paper that costs SGD 400+!!!

Anyway, the bright blue background for all these photos is my bedsheet! Yeah, I'm a true-blue gender-bender. Hehe.

And we've booked our hostels too! We've staying at Prague-1 hostel in Prague & Wombat's Hostel in Munich. Booked them from hostelworld! Very good booking system, fuss-free! Hope that everything goes smoothy! The 'ratings' system makes it very easy to compare the hostels too!

Alright, that's all.... less than 2 weeks before departure!!! Whoooppeees :D

Socks that Rock :)

Warning: Slightly frivalous entry ahead.


We bought some socks!


When Nicole, the German pharmacy student came over to Singapore last year, she was fascinated by the pair of socks I was wearing cos they don't have them back in Germany.

Well, Maggie and I finally managed to find them at Far East Plaza and so we bought 2 pairs for her :) Well she totally deserves them cos she's like suuuper nice and we can't wait to see her again when we're in Germany!

what do you call these socks?

Ticket bought!

As the title says! $1380 ticket. Do you see that hole in my pocket?

KLM Royal Dutch direct flight to Amsterdam. Departs SIN at 10.45pm on 7/7/07. You're welcome to see me off :)

And I've applied for the PSS award for students going for overseas programmes. That's an award of up to $1000, so it'll definitely lighten my load by alot. My interview's coming up on the 2nd of June, so likewise, well-wishes are very welcome.

In case you guys didn't know, Sarah's already in Canada right now for her exchange. She's been posting on her blog pretty regularly about her adventures, so feel free to visit her blog at www.eshortone.blogspot.com.