Feesten

In English meaning feasts, parties or just plain get-togethers with booze. Ah, we are indeed back to that time of the year when the holiday season calls us to party! That means non-stop attendance of gatherings since Friday last week, at least for me. Before I realized, the weekend flew out the window so quick. Monday came and I found myself sitting, and brooding a bit in the conference room during our early Monday meeting at work wondering why I was there when I thought yesterday was still Friday, lol. These days, I am coming home late and sleeping in the next day only to wake up for the next party. UGHHHH. I am not a party beast so this is really taking a toll on my selfish ‘me’ times.



I have here a few fotos of the boat ride during our Christmas party at work, after that we had a comedian, and a magician who took me as his greenhorn subject, entertain us at a restaurant near Leidseplein. Below are also some fotos of my dinner last night with a very good friend Herr Philippe whom I haven’t seen for a while. He brought me to this really nice place in Amsterdam, in Haarlemmerstraat, home to quite a number of gourmet shops and alternative restaurants.




Fotos are blurred... because I really need to buy a new camera. The boat was also moving faster here so it wasn't very easy to take fotos on the dock. The second foto is the 'Romantic (Draw)Bridge' near Carre Theater and Amstel Hotel. Amsterdam is always lovely on a boat cruise... by day and by night. I've done both, a couple of times already.





Here is a very tired me during the Christmas Party at work - didn't really have many fotos of myself though and in this one I look like I had too much wine (looking sleepy as usual). The middle foto is the popular cuisine street, Harlemmerstraat in Amsterdam... and me obviously, taken last night Monday by Herr Philippe. Below is a pretty row of typical Dutch 'trapgevel' houses or buildings in Renaissance style in the Haarlemmerbuurt area (north west of Amsterdam Centrum). To the left of these buildings is Haarlemmerstraat already.



Here is a very cool way of viewing the real street in moving pictures (click here): Haarlemmerstraat - drag the cursor (sleep mij) below the foto slowly, and to view the rest of the shops on the street click on the building numbers just right below the cursor, i.e. 2-32, 46-96, etcetera and drag again the moving cursor or let it move on its own.



Dutchman and I also went to a party in Friesland and we came home the next day at past two in the morning. Obviously we overslept and we had to rush our running very late brunch and drive straight to IJsselstein for another party, a birthday gathering of the family for my niece.

This coming weekend will be lots of work, general cleaning at home and tidying my walk-in closet, which is one of our spare bedrooms and home to my burgeoning collection of clothes, shoes, bags and accessories. Loads of clean clothes piled on top of each other on the carpet floor and like my neglected little orphans, they have been desperately crying and reaching out to me to be hanged and folded in the closet, for weeks! So lots of chores to be done before Christmas and I am so not looking forward to it. Plus, the Dutchman wants to hang the TV on the living room wall which will involve drilling and of course me assisting him.

After all these, off we go to Germany for the Christmas Markets!

I must say that I am more excited about the latter. The former, I badly need help, I really don't mind forking out you know.

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