Rotterdam

I thought i was doing OK, i thought 'yeah Holland is a beautiful, but i don't like it more than Australia' Then i visited Rotterdam. I guess i have big city syndrome,  Rotterdam has me total in awe, and i haven't even been to Amsterdam yet! There is something about a big city, with so many different kinds of people that makes you feel very insecure and makes you yearn for a new and exciting life in the big smoke.

On tuesday Jan and Inga picked from Hoorn and took us to their House in Rotterdam, which is HUGE. Very nice with lots of artistic furniture and two huge bathrooms with free standing baths and lots of bedrooms and dining rooms and lounge rooms and drawing rooms, etc. I felt very fancy staying there.
We went out for a really nice meal that night, to an italian restaurant in the city.

After tea Jan took us to this amazing hotel to have a look at. It had a middle eastern theme and all the rooms were furnished differently, and the foyer was just amazing, i felt like i had stepped on to the set of Arabian Nights
He also showed us a lingerie store called Marlies Dekkerss that sells designer underwear. He was telling us all the fitting rooms are huge, and are specially designed so that your partner can come in and watch you try everything on. It all sounded very risque to me; Marlies Dekkers


''in the future everyone will be famous for 15 minutes''
outside Marlies Dekkers

  The next day Mum, Inga and I went shopping in Rotterdam.

in inga's front yard

 Insert 4 hours of shopping here.

We caught the bus into town that day and on our way back to the bus stop we walked past the Rotterdam town hall.

This is where my Oma worked during WWII as a telephonist. She was the youngest telephonist in all of Rotterdam! And Inga said every night her dad would wait outside to pick her up from work. It is very surreal to be standing there, in the city where Oma and Opa met and fell in love, trying to picture it all.

Rotterdam has very few original buildings because most of the were bombed during the war, even if they weren;t directly hit they bombed all the fire stations in the city so buildings would eventually burn down.

 After our wonderful day of shopping mum and Inga were exhausted so I went home and had a long bath while they organised tea. Not really, we all relaxed and got take away for tea, eating it infront of the TV. Inga's daughter Marsha, mums cousin, drove us back to Hoorn about 9.30 that night. I have met Marsha once before the first time we came to Holland but i couldnt remember her, so i was excited to meet her. My whole life i my oma has told me i look so much like Marsha. I couldnt see it personally.
It will be good to go back to Rotterdam with Paul and the boys and explore it more.

Tomorrow we are off to Germany for the day to drop Harry, Remy and Paul off.