Zofona > Zofona Seoul > Stories: English and Dutch > Our Korea stories > August 29: 2005

August 29: 2005

After a long holiday in The Netherlands I will tell you some things about it. Of course I do not remember everything and I have to practise on my written English again because I only spoke and wrote Dutch.

First of all we met my brother Kees at the airport because he had to help us with my bicycle which we brought from Seoul. With all the luggage it was not possible to bring the bike home with us so my brother was so kind to pick it up and deliver it a week later. During that week he had put new tires on my bike and repaired some small damages. He told me that while he was walking towards his car with my bike some people stared at him as if he was stupid. Who will bring a bicycle to The Netherlands when it is possible to buy a new or a second hand one in every city? Well I did, since my bicycle was standing and doing nothing while it is still a good one. I consider it to dangerous cycling in Seoul and besides that we live in an area with a lot of steep hills and I am a Dutch cyclist who likes flat. Wind and rain does not matter, but steep hills, no thanks. A friend of mine gave me a baby chair to put on my bike so I could cycle with Vibeke. Jitze received a bicycle from a friend who just bought a new one and after buying an extra seat on that one we were able to cycle with the whole family. Of course we did not do that but Jitze cylced with Yde around town a few times and one time they ended up on the "Peperbus".

The Peperbus is a tower which belongs to a church in the centre of Zwolle and it is the tallest building in the city. The day that Jitze and Yde decided to go there it was open for public so they climbed up all the stairs and had a magnificient view over the city of Zwolle. Not knowing I was somewhere walking below on the market place Jitze called me to say that they were on top of the Peperbus. When I looked up I could clearly see them standing and waving. Yde really liked it and when he came home he proudly showed me a card which every person receives when they return down stairs.

Another thing what was very important to me was the making of a walk -in wardrobe. Up to then we had all our clothes in our suitcases so Jitze decided to make a wardrobe in one of the corners of our bedroom. With our friend Coen he built an very nice wardrobe with sliding doors and a lot of space in it. The only thing he wants to do the next time is making some lights in it so when you open the door the light switches on. Step by step our house is getting the looks we want it to have. For Yde's room we bought a nice blue wardrobe at IKEA and we bought another (red) cabinet for our tv and stereo. Everything we have can be put behind doors and I am very satisfied with it.

We did many more things like visiting family and friends, going to the ZOO in Emmen, going to a large outdoor playground near our house and Yde visited "Kabouterland" with my brother and his wife. We met a lot of Jitze's colleagues and their children on a beach near Scheveningen and Yde went twice with his grandparents to a goat farm "Geertje" in Stompwijk where you can feed the goats and the pigs with milk and special dry food.

We had a great holiday until Yde got chicken pox and Jitze had to leave alone for Seoul. A week later Jitze managed to book the tickets (everytime one of the KLM-girls put me on hold to check something with our tickets the connection broke off and when I called back there were no seats available and they acted not very friendly and helpful, so finaly Jitze called from Seoul and after the line being broke off again he started to be less friendly and he made a reservation). But two days before our flight home Vibeke started to show some signs of chicken pox and we cancelled again and to avoid problems we made already another reservation. Also that flight we had to cancel since Vibeke was not done with her chicken pox. But on the 24th of August she was able to fly and we headed for home. So now we are in Seoul again and life will go on as always. Probably the next story will be about Yde and his first school days, his birthday and our guest to come "Dirk".

Christina