the end. or just the beginning?

“We shall not cease from exploration

and at the end of all our exploring

will be to arrive where we started

and know the place for the first time.”

T.S. Eliot

4:14 PM and pitch black outside my library window

(We're really far north. Which equals not much sunlight during these winter months)

Apologies for the lack of posts lately, but now as I sit in the library working on research for an essay that isn't due for 2.5 weeks I feel obligated to update...

Edinburgh:

tastie tatties.

backed potato + lots of different toppings to choose from ( I chose chicken tikka-

they are curry crazy over here and I like it).

looks gross, tastes unbelievably delicious.

what I saw outside the bus on our way to Scotland vs. Fiji rugby game.

friends at said rugby game.

crazy men.

hostel living.

where J.K. Rowling wrote..

table she sat at. with view of Edinburgh castle.

I love Edinburgh lots.

London:

Big Ben.

Buckingham Palace.

crazy awesome bird we saw while walking through St. James Park.

best life choice.

Wonderful place- Tate Modern.

Traveling. Seeing. It's all really cool. But it's not these pictures that matter. Sure they represent small fragments of things that hit my optical nerves, but in the large scheme of things they don't compare to what in actuality is of importance.  *I'm not disregarding pictures*  I am obviously a LOVER of photos! Capturing beauty that is fleeting and transforming it into a permanent object (a photograph).  Bringing attention to others sights that are so often overlooked. How they tell stories.  I have deep love for photographs... and taking them. But what I'm trying to get at is what is MOST important.  It's the time spent with friends exploring. It's the talking, listening, responding, silence, amazement, confusion and understanding that matters. The things that will have affected me most from my time abroad will not be these pictures. It will be everything mentioned above.

I think one reason why I haven't posted much lately is because words have seem to become really unsatisfying lately. Everything is still processing.. verbalizing takes lots of effort.

 I'm not ready to be torn from this place where I am just learning how to j-walk without fear of death, where I am now learning to be a culinary success in the kitchen, where I finally know my way around the city, where I am building relationships....  However, the holidays beckon me and I can't wait to be embraced by my family and friends back home in 3 short weeks. Excited for Christmas music in my living room, and being in a HOUSE with maybe a couch or three, laying by a fireplace...  Bittersweet.

This weekend Ella and I are off to York to visit our good friend Molly. We've been planning to visit each other while we're both in the UK since.... February of last year? She came to Aberdeen in October now it's our turn to see the place she's being calling home for the past few months... can't wait :)

sending ALL my love to my adventure-followers,
Jess



(no clue why the spacing is being weird on this post!..sorry bout that)

Side note

If you watched my Ben Nevis video on Youtube, hope you enjoyed it! I have heard good reviews. We like it lots as well, thanks :)

If you want to really be inspired to be a superhero, look at this video : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sgl9PDEOdeU&feature=related

Every year they have a race up the mountain.... and I think it is so cool.

pretty soon I will update you about real life. but I'm swamped at the moment and this is just brief procrastination, a real post would be major procrastination.

talk to you all soon.

trying to catch time as it is slipping away (...one more month =/ )

The best I can do.

I could type pages and pages of how waterfalls flew down the mountain side like streamers being let loose from above or try my hardest to verbalize the feeling I experienced being on that summit. . . but my words could never suffice. There is a small link on the left side of my blog a little ways down that says My Youtube Page.  Click it.  Watch "Ben Nevis"  That's the best I can do to re-tell (via internet) the events of this past Saturday.   

The words that flooded my mind the entire time:

i thank you God for most this amazing by E. E. Cummings

i thank You God for most this amazing

day:for the leaping greenly spirits of trees

and a blue true dream of sky;and for everything

wich is natural which is infinite which is yes

(i who have died am alive again today,

and this is the sun's birthday;this is the birth

day of life and love and wings:and of the gay

great happening illimitably earth)

how should tasting touching hearing seeing

breathing any-lifted from the no

of all nothing-human merely being

doubt unimaginable You?

(now the ears of my ears awake and

now the eyes of my eyes are opened)

Off to visit our neighbors.

This past weekend, four friends and I decided to do a little island hopin.  We went to Ireland. It was a trip I will never forget...

We made it to Dublin with no problem at all.  The one hour flight was over before I could finish a chapter of my book.  The bus ride to Galway was a bit longer, but it was completely worth it when we got there.  Perfect weather allowed us to enjoy our drinks from the most famous pub in Galway, The Quays (a recommendation from my Irish flat-mate), outside on the streets where we were able to take in all the people, shops, and night culture.  

Saturday we explored the town.  We went in the shops, ate delicious crepes, walked the dock by the sea, visited a market, and went to the Galway Halloween Festival (which included a re-make of MJ's Thriller video). 

         

  

Saturday night, Halloween, was great. There was a party at our hostel with lots of free snacks and drinks.  We played games with other travelers and met people from Australia, Finland, and all over-even a Michigander (who worked at the hostel). After that, we went back outside.  We heard there was some more of the festival activities, but we didn't really know what.  As we were walking down the streets, we somehow got swept up into this MASSIVE parade! There were people with these huge orange masks on, hundreds of different costumes, musicians, and just people dancing down the streets.  We joined them.  We danced for what seemed like hours and just had the best time ever.  As it was happening, I couldn't really believe I was dancing down the streets of Ireland in a halloween parade.  It was so good.

Now begins the series of not-so-fortunate events...

It all began with a curious look given to me by the man with a braid in his beard who asked me where the rest of my details were on my boarding pass as I handed it to him before entering the gates to walk to the plane.  I replied, 'what details?'  'Right here', he said, as he pointed to a few lines on my boarding pass that I didn't give a second thought to.  As a confused expression formed on my face, he started talking to the other Ryanair worker who was scanning the other line's boarding passes. After being told that I was missing some crucial information on my boarding pass that I really should have, the other worker told my braided beard friend that he should just let me go. As I again showed my boarding pass to the lovely flight attendant at the door of the plane and received no such scolding, I sat down and got situated on the plane.  When my other friends sat down and Andy told us that one of the flight attendants took his ticket, we were a bit confused.  We talked about the fact that we were missing the so-called 'crucial' information on our boarding pass from Aberdeen to Dublin, but absolutely no one said anything to us about it.

Just after we had fastened our seat belts and got comfortable after concluding that it was just a strange thing that happened, a lady with a too-tight bun and painted on smile said, 'You five need to come with me and talk to our captain.' I don't even know what I was thinking at that point.  We went up, were told we had to get off the plane, tried to argue a bit about the fact that this situation was being handled in two completely different ways since no one in Aberdeen told us it was a problem, being told that was their fault and they could all be fired, we got dropped off in the middle of the runway. We were let back in to the airport by a man in a bright orange vest that usually handles the luggage.  We wandered around the deserted hallways, talked to as many people as we could about the situation, ended up spending way too many euros on internet usage in the airport and way too many euros buying a new plane ticket and bus ticket for the next day.  

The following pictures document our airport camp sites for that evening as we had about 14 hours to kill until our next flight....

Truth of the matter is- the night was spent with a lot of reading, writing, good conversation, card playing (with guys from Finland that we met in the hostel who coincidentally had a flight at 1 AM that morning), i-pod listening, and humor.  Julie and I formed a new language and laughed at pretty much everything.

As I mentioned earlier, this is a trip I will NEVER forget.  Mostly for unbelievably wonderful reasons and a little because of some silly events that went down in the Dublin airport...

Awaken, Sleeper.

Every single day I walk through Seaton Park.  I take the same path to class through the same beautiful grass patches and flower beds and walkways canopied by trees.  After realizing we accidently left one hour earlier for classes (day light savings time can really mess a person up), Julie and I had to kill some time.  We decided to walk around the park.  The park we walk through every single day.  What did we stumble upon? A rushing river. Water flowing through bundles of red, green, and yellow reflecting the sunlight like spotlights on the leaves.

A perfect bench for the two of us.

A reminder.

Everyday is new.

Dear Autumn, I love you very much.

Let me just inform you: Autumn in Scotland = So so so extremely wonderful.

Favorite things as of late:

Shortbread (from Harbor House in St. Andrews)

Tea (!!!)

Winter hats

Lentil soup from the most small town diner you could ever find

St. Andrews University

Wool socks

Vitamin C

The fact that Scottish people are so tough. Ask me about this sometime.

As most of you know, My mama bear and Gus visited me this past week. On the day of their arrival I started to feel ill. Really fatigued, extremely sore throat, just plain old achy. I'm trying to find words that are not cliche.. but have not succeeded- In all honesty, it was SUCH a 'blessing in disguise'. One may think, "shoot my mom and step-dad just flew some 4000 miles to see me, and here I am being anything but perky and enthusiastic because I feel like CRAP!" But... it was more like "Thank the LORD that I am with my mom right now because when I am sick there is no where I rather be than embraced in her arms!" So, in actuality it was so great that I got sick at the same time they were here. I mean, it would've been wonderful if I wasn't sick at all- but if there was ever a time to get sick while I'm in Scotland, it was now... It would've made it a lot harder if I didn't have my mom's fabulous nursing skills here with me...

Despite my illness, with lots of tea and medicine I seemed to be pretty manageable during the day. It was quite amazing because we had THREE FULL DAYS OF SUNSHINE on our FULL days together! Friday we went to Inverness- walked around the town, hunted for the Loch Ness Monster and saw beautiful castle ruins that looked out over the loch. Saturday we went to Fyvie- ate a the most wonderful random diner next to a post office that we found out about by Gus asking a woobely old grandma walking down the street where a restaurant was, witnessed the most stunning autumn colors I've ever seen, explored a really sweet castle (where a wedding was taking place that very day), stopped at the lovely tearoom and had some strawberry sponge cake and took a beautiful wooded path to the beach by my flat. Sunday we went to St. Andrews- shopped along the awesome Market Street, got laughed at when we asked a store worker where the University was (he replied- "In America they buy a plot of land and build a university on it, but us... we've been building this place for 1600 years"), were blown away by the architecture of the university buildings, saw the St. Andrews castle and the world's famous golf course, spent a perfect fall day together and had the most delicious short bread EVER! Other than that we walked around Aberdeen, checked out some of the local restaurants, and saw my campus. And one time I just escaped from my chaotic flat and went to their cozy hotel room to simply rest under the warm covers.

I am SO lucky that I got to have family visit me while I am here. I am even more happy that I gave my mom an excuse to make her first trip to Europe. There were some extremely hilarious moments like when I found out that my mom and Gus had asked for the crappiest car possible (just in case) but instead were given a Mercedes or when my mom decided to feed some swans and the vicious creatures started attacking her so she grabbed a massive stick to swat them off (view pictures above). Despite the circumstances of me being sick and the difficulty that learning how to drive on the opposite side of the road and on the opposite side of the car proved to be for Gus, it was the best visit I could've asked for.

I feel nothing but thankful right now to have had that extremely beautiful time with mom and Gus, to be starting to feel better (I think...), and to know that one of my bestest friends is visiting me this weekend who is studying at this very moment in York, England!

Hope everyone is enjoying this Fall weather as much as I am (besides my friends in South America/ Australia of course),

with love,

Jess

New things are beautiful things

Right now I am missing the security of my classes back at Hope. As I sat in Cells & Genetics, Human Physiology and other classes of the sort I always wondered if I was missing out on the freedom given to students in art class or the theological challenge given to students studying religion. When things got really challenging, like during finals week, I wondered: would I be happier learning how to read and develop poems or in a class teaching me how to teach children dance? But now that I am in completely different courses than I have ever been in, finding myself SOLELY graded on 2 essays in each course, I have my answer.

My mind is going to be stretched this semester. It's only week two and I am learning how poets and philosophers responded to the French Bourgeoisie Revolution of 1848, where the idea of morality comes from, and who the Celts really were. (thankfully I do have some Medical Sociology =] )

I miss the certainty of how the myosin and actin filaments slide as you move your muscles or how myelin sheath between axon terminals and dendrites all work together to fire signals down your nerves to make your body function. I miss learning about the different stages of life and how your cognition and motor skills progress and re-shape throughout those stages. I miss having little quizzes every week to make sure I am understanding the key concepts of how a left sided brain injury would affect the rest of your life or even the intellectual challenge that comes with cramming for an exam in Chemistry! But the truth is- I cannot MISS these things anymore. I am in a new place in a new time. These new classes will broaden my awareness of past events, allow me to read important pieces of literature, and tone up my library researching skills. Ella told me her mom always says- "Bloom where you are planted" I want to bloom here in Aberdeen. Although I am walking in unfamiliar territory, I will no longer think of the safe things or the ways of the past, but will truly immerse myself in these waters. The more I write about it, the more excited I am for all that lays ahead of me.

Another really exciting thing is that I am taking Spanish! It is not a course that will give me credits that transfer back to Hope, but is a part of the Language Centre and continuing education here at the uni. It meets once a week for two hours in the evening. I had my first class tonight and it was wonderful. I really love the Spanish language and have a deep desire to enhance my skills. I am really looking forward to working on my communication skills as we will spend most of the time just talking. With the huge Spanish- speaking population in Chicago area hospitals and the prospects of one day using my love of physical therapy to reach spanish speaking countries, I know this will come in great use. I would be extremely naive to never learn it. This will help me reach even more people.

This weekend in Aviemore was incredible. The town was beautiful, the food was ridiculously delicious, and the people were kind and loving. We were able to hike up to a green loch (lake) despite the rain and winds. I love being outside more than anything in the whole world. Scotland is such a beautiful country and I am happy for all the chances I have to just simply be outdoors. For example, today I walked about 10 minutes to the beach to find a nice cozy bench amidst the trees just to read. I need to do this as often as I can until it starts to get really, really cold. Crisp autumn air has already been with us for a while.

with all my love,

Jess

Firsts

I have survived my week of many firsts, but I have a feeling this is just the beginning of many, many firsts to come. I like it this way. A lot.

-First time in a hostel (loved)

-First time seeing a furry highland cow

-First time standing in a cloud

-First time attending uni (college) in a different country

-First time taking class at a medical school (I had to drop my psych class because of conflicts, so I enrolled in "The Social Influences on Health & Illness", turns out it's in the med school (first thing I've been nervous about through all my travels), turned out sooo great though )

-First time at a Ceilidh (traditional Gaelic social dance originating in Scotland & Ireland - I wish social dance was still this way... I'm quite positive it would solve our nation's obesity problem)

-First time doing Capoeira http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gt9Yt8lafYo (we are learning how to play the instruments that you see in the back and the songs as well. I am looking forward to learning more of the history of Capoeira. A girl briefly told me it came to Brazil by African Slaves who needed to train for battle, but weren't allowed to so they kind of hid it by turning it into a form of dancing? Not sure how accurate that is... hopefully I will learn soon... all I know is it is very fun and I love it and will now being doing in every Tuesday and Thursday from 7-9)

-witnessed two of my flat mates having their first taste of peanut butter (I know...insanity)

-First time ever not having class on Fridays (!!!!!)

-my very own first ever jar of Nutella.... completely consumed

This weekend I'm off to Aviemore for a retreat with some of my friends and New Life International Church (and a bunch of other people from around Scotland, I think). If you'd like to see it on the map or read info about it click http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aviemore. I'm really excited. I need to learn some new words for excited. It's all I am lately.

Until I can report back some more firsts...

CHEERS

I have arrived

Hello everyone. apologies for the lack of posting lately, but I have been extremely busy, as you can imagine would be the case when a girl packs up and moves to a different country for three months, registers in a new university, gets to know the lay of the land, makes some new friends, and breathes a little. It has almost been one entire week that I have been in Scotland, and because of this way to much has happened that I cannot post it all, but I'll try to cover the basics.

It all started off as I should've expected it to start off.

I have a curse. This curse is the curse of move in day to college. Let me tell you about it.

Move in day freshman year goes as follows: Jess wakes up with one side of her face being the size of a bowling ball due to an infection post wisdom teeth removal. While packing her belongings, the electricity goes out in the house for many hours and does not come back on. After packing up the vehicle with all her belongings and getting in the car to drive to Michigan, the car decides to die. After repacking a new vehicle, the Chicago-land area decides to take part in a massive monsoon thus highways are extremely flooded which causes quite a bit of traffic.

Move in day sophmore year isn't quite as bad. However, the person that my roommate and I bought our loft from jipped us so we didn't receive all the pieces of the loft. While my loving mother did her best to put it together or find kind young men to put it together, she had a bit of a meltdown in thinking that I would have no where to sleep.

Move in day junior year (to Scotland) is by far the best. Jess and Ella hop on their plane from Amsterdam to Heathrow without a problem. 5:00 AM they're at the airport and on their way. Upon arrival in Heathrow they realize they don't have much time to get to their second flight. They decide to walk rather quickly. When they get to their next destination, customs, they realize the line is EXTREMELY long. They try to ask a incredibly kind airport worker who incredibly kindly declines them the ability to go in a quicker line because they're "just" students. They miss their next plan by 10 minutes. 3 hours later they are on the next plane to Aberdeen. Because the time of their arrival just magically decided to coincide with a lunch outing that the whole group and group director were going on, they had to fend for themselves for the rest of the day until the following day when we would met the group for campus tour, etc. But alls well that ends well. They hopped in a taxi, got to campus, got to their flats (however Jess was in a temporary flat for a few days as hers wasn't ready), walked downtown which the distance was unknown to the two of them, and got some food. Quite the eventful day!

I am finally settled in my new room. It's nice and cozy and I like it. There's a big window that gets lots of sun and since it has been so nice out lately I have been able to keep it open to get a wonderful breeze. It has only rained one day since I have been here, which really contradicts my expectations! However, I have been reminded that this will definitely not last. Our group took an excursion to the ruins of Arbroath Alley which was founded in 1178 by King William for a group of monks. The ancient stone walls were breathtaking and it was so cool being able to walk around and see where the monks slept, lived, etc.

On Sunday some friends and I decided we wanted to go to church. We didn't know anything about any churches around, but we heard that there would be churches outside our central building who would walk with us to their separate churches. We didn't know which one to choose since we didn't know anything about them but we chose one called New Life International Church. It ended up being a wonderful time with wonderful music, a great message, and even soup and bread and cookies after. We actually got to talking to some of the people our age and there is an age 18+ retreated in two weekends that we are going to go on! I forget where in Scotland it is, but they all said it's extremely beautiful and just a great time.

The Christian Union here at the uni is quite awesome. They hosted an international meal last night and there were TONS of people there and tons of delicious food. My friends from my program and I decided that we wouldn't talk much with each other, but would really make our best effort to meet new people. I met some amazing new friends and I'm really excited to get to know them better! Yesterday I met someone from Palatine and someone from Elmhurst which is SO close to Park Ridge, which is crazy. I also met an amazing lady named Tracy who is a practicing doc here in Aberdeen and she has 2 little boys aged 2 and 5 so hopefully I will get to play with them in the park soon.

This post is getting way too long, but those are some cool things that have happened lately! Here's the low-down on my flatmates. I have 2 from Scotland- Lauren and Camilla (she actually lived in South Africa til she was 7), one from Ireland- Bri, one from Hungary/France- Nikole, and one from Germany- Jana. I haven't talked with them all very much since we never all seem to be in the flat at the same time, but have had some good conversation with Nikole and Jana. Nikole loves salsa so I'm going to take classes with her and also help her with her English and she's going to help me with Spanish because she can speak many languages! Jana is really sweet and she just moved in yesterday, so I'm excited to talk more with her. It's extremely strange not living with good friends, but I really think it will be a good experience.

One more thing.. I finally got to register for classes today! I am taking "Literature, History, and Thought: 1848 - 9/11", "Romans, Celts, Druids, and Warriors", "Moral Philosophy", and "Psychology for Neuroscience and Sports Studies". I am so excited about all my courses. They all sound interesting and will all end up transferring as credits back at Hope and will help me meet my requirements from gen. eds. and my psych minor!

Everything here in Aberdeen is really good. I can't wait to begin classes next Monday and also for my trip to Isle of Skye this weekend. I am going to continue to meet new people, figure out Aberdeen, and trust God. Life has been so good and I am thankful for it every second of the day.

I love you all!

(pictures will hopefully be posted soon)

Every end is a new beginning

We have payed our last visit to a dutch bakery and made our last bike ride into town. I took my last glimpse of Teylingen and said goodbye to all my Voorhoutian friends. As my time in Holland comes to a finish there's nothing else I can be but thankful. What a wonderful ten days I have spent here. I have seen so much and learned so much! I have met some extremely wonderful people and have been shown amazing hospitality. While eating poffertjes (little dutch pancakes) at Kermis (the festival in town) with our friends Marijke, Petra, Sandra, and Anton, Ella and I mentioned how we really liked the mugs that we were drinking our hot chocolate out of. The next day... Anton and Petra brought us 2. Anton also brought me a little surprise of a container of poeder suiker (powdered sugar) because apparently I was scrapping the last bits of it off of our plate of pancakes ... and he noticed :) People are just extremely kind here and I have felt very welcomed.

Although I am truly going to miss Holland and everyone I have met here, I am soooo pumped to start my next adventure in Scotland! Tomorrow we are getting up at 4:15 AM to be picked up at 5:00 AM for our flight at 7:20 AM. We will move in to our flats and meet with everyone in our program for lunch. After that I think we have the whole afternoon free to explore! Ella and I will go grocery shopping and hopefully get a little bit of a feel for Aberdeen.

Thanks everyone for reading along my journey and I hope I haven't bored you too much yet. You should probably leave me a comment or four so I know what you're thinking about. I really do miss most of you. Well, probably all of you. Wish I could give you real life hugs instead of world wide web ones. (that was for you, Gus).

Well, take a look at the Nederlands Part 2 pictures in the link to the left! enjoy enjoy enjoy.

mucho amor,

Jessica Linn

Photos are up!

halllo.

my photos are now on the left side of my page if you scroll down a bit you should be able to see them! Ella and I have been busy hiking through dunes, frolicking in the North Sea, being Nederlanders and biking into town and going to the market, eating Dutch pastries and candy, taking boat tours to little islands that don't have grocery stores but have a grocery truck that comes through, running around castle ruins, visiting Great Aunts were not expecting us, who don't speak English, don't know who we are, but who bring us in and have a cup of tea with us. Life is good in Holland and I am learning a lot about a lot. It is very exciting. God has given me so much. I am very blessed. I can't wait to take all this knowledge to better serve His people.

miss you all. hope you like the pictures :)

my blogger homepage is in Dutch.. .good thing I can read Dutch...

hello hello hello!

some people are confused as to why I am in Holland (The Netherlands, same thing- remember?) So I thought I'd inform the general public. The reason being because I have a friend from Hope named Ella Vandervlugt who decided that Scotland would be her destination for a study abroad experience as well. Ella's father was born here in Holland so she has family here and while she was growing up she visited her often. She decided that since our semester starts fairly late and we will be going to Europe anyways, she might as well make a pit stop in Holland and brought me along as well :) So that is how I got this amazing opportunity to visit Holland before Scotland. It's really great though because family and family friends have been taking us all over and showing us all the great spots to visit since they know best. BUT, Our first solo adventure went down today...

No Plan in Amsterdam. That's what we called it.

We knew that this was a city that we must visit, so we went. Ella had actually never been to Amsterdam before, so it was new for both of us. We hopped on a train and about 45 minutes later were in Amsterdam's Central Station. The only thing we knew that we really wanted to do was to visit Anne Frank's house. This was an incredibly amazing experience. I couldn't believe I was actually standing in the room that for TWO whole years 8 people stayed in hiding. Can you even imagine not being able to breath in fresh air or hear a bird chirp or even go to a friend's house for two years? I definitely cannot even fathom that. My favorite part of the museum was that when Anne Frank was in hiding she had one magazine and a sticker book and she put some pictures on her wall to make it more cheerful and they were still there! That was so awesome to me. I learned so much about the German invasion in The Netherlands and how the Jewish people had to live. It was really a great experience and it was worth our whole trip to Amsterdam just to see that.

Afterwards we walked to the Hortus Botanicus (Botanical Garden). We spent lots of time there looking at all the plants, green houses, and just sitting in cozy little spots and people watching. It was such a beautiful place, I loved it. After this we went to a grocery store, bought some food, found a place of solitude amidst the chaos of the city and ate our dinner :)

I really loved the two main things that we did there. They were amazing. As for the city... not my favorite. Streets are extremely narrow, it is extremely crowded, people and more people and even more bikes whizzing past at all times. Usually I love cities, but this one.. not so much. There were some beautiful things to be found there like the canals (obviously) and some of the larger really old buildings, but the atmosphere there is not what I am usually looking for, to say the least. If you have exact places you want to visit like museums, etc., then it is fine- but as for just walking around, I think here I'd rather go to a quaint dutch village like Delft. so far my favorite. Even though that was the case, our time there today was wonderful and I am really happy we went. Anne Frank's museum was so interesting and the gardens were the best I've ever seen.

Still sending love from The Nederlands,

Jess

P.S.

Details like this will probably not be the case once everything starts getting busy...

P.P.S

It takes way too long to upload pictures on my blog, but once I do upload pictures on my facebook I will be able to post a link here and even if you do not have a facebook you will be able to see ALL of them which will be a lot more than I'd be able to put here.

Nederlands

helllllllo! I am currently sitting in the room Ella and I are staying in at her Tante (aunt) Coby and Ome (uncle) Marten's house. Before I begin discussing things any further.. I have a clarification to make for those that I misled. The Netherlands is to Holland just as America is to The United States. I wasn't really clear about that.. but now I am! There are provinces here.. I don't know how many, but the province we are in is South Holland... which doesn't really make sense to me because we aren't even that far south in Holland. But there is a North Holland province and a South Holland province and obviously many others, but we are in the South Holland province. The town that we are in is Voorhout. Tante Coby and Ome Marten's house is in the country with flower bud fields all around. There is also a couple goats (is that how do you pluralize a goat?) and the biggest bunny rabbit and a horse and many other creatures next to the canal that is right next to us. They have a HUGE garden behind us with the most beautiful flowers, all samples from Ella's dad's business Dutch Gardens. Flowers are huge in Holland... everyone has gardens and really awesome flowers. There are canals everywhere here. Parallel to all the roads and drive ways and such. The reason being because Holland is LOWER than sea level. Interesting, huh? This is probably the lowest altitude I'll ever be at... which is cool, maybe the air is richer here or something? So the canals have something to do with the low altitude and how the sea is higher and they help so the country doesn't flood or something to that extent. I haven't really got the science nailed down, but I mean it's really beautiful so that's cool.

Where to start where to start? From the beginning, I suppose. My apologies for those who aren't looking for something long to read .. there's just so much to tell and I enjoy writing! Also, apologies to my friends because I know my family is interested in lots of details.. so maybe everyone else should just skim? or skip to when the pictures start popping up?

SO, the flight here went really smoothly. Went through security, customs, etc. without one question from the grumpy workers. It was fabulous! The only problem we encountered was a 30 minute delay on the first flight because of leaky water or something, but that all got straightened out and we were on our way to Heathrow/London. Quite an interesting event occurred there! First of all, I was barely conscious as we made our way through that airport to our next gate because I took drowsy inducing dramamine way late in our first flight because it was through the night and I couldn't sleep and I thought that would be an important thing to do, but I took it with only 3 hours left in the flight which led me to be drowsy for many hours post landing. With all that said, we got to Heathrow at sometime the next day and when we found the gate and sat down Ella saw a girl with a sweatshirt on that read the word: HOPE. Not many people go around wearing hoodies that say things like HOPE ....UNLESS.... you go to Hope College! So she was kind of sitting crowded by many other people and since I was not in a good state of mind we just kind of like laughed about how ironic that was that we would see somebody from our small college in Michigan in a HUGE airport in London, but after the flight when we were getting our luggage (I was much more awake at this point) we saw her and I asked her if she went to Hope College and she was like Yeah! and then we noticed that she was wearing Dance Marathon pants and we were like oh man this is crazy. And it was. And we asked her what she was doing in Amsterdam and she said she is on her honey moon and that she is half dutch and has never been there so she came! God is really good at reminding you where you come from when your thousands of miles away... He always tends to show up :)

I already have written way to much and I haven't even made it to Voorhout..

Basically since our arrival we have been taking lots of walks and have taken 1 bike ride with many more to come. EVERYONE here rides bikes, and I honestly mean everyone. There are streets for bikes next to the normal streets and even some busier intersections have stop lights for bikes. The lifestyle is SO active here. I have yet to see one person that is obese. There are so many beautiful towns around here today we biked to Lisse and Sassenheim. We walked to this castle called Teylingen which is about a 10 or 15 minute away walk. It was built in the 1300s... it's beautiful. It wasn't open so we couldn't go super close so we are going to go back there on Wednesday so we can walk around it more. We also saw another castle on our bike ride called something like D'ever. 2 castles in my first full day here. Later in the day we went to Delft which is an AMAZING city with ancient buildings, beautiful canals, tons of terrace style restaurants, and so much diversity. I loved it.

My time in Holland has just begun seeing as we have 10 more days here. I'm really excited for everything and will definitely keep you guys updated. My memory card adapter card thing is in the bottom of my backpack under a lot of stuff and I haven't worked up the energy to get it out, but when I do I will upload pictures and then my stories will make more sense.

Thank you everyone for your prayers and support and love in sending me here on my first journey in Europe. Ella and I are now jamming to Sufjan Stevens and trying to wind down from the excitement of our internet working... I'll keep you as updated as I can.

love from The Nederlands,

Jess

soaking up my last few days in the states

less than 20 days until departure. it's so close I can already taste the salty sea air of Aberdeen. but first... The Netherlands. I'm so so so grateful for this opportunity. Can't wait to see where the journey leads... :)

“Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one’s lifetime.” —Mark Twain, 1857