The dinner

Good morning. Looks like one of the new neighbours has been trying out their balcony and needs to get educated on social behaviour. There were just as many in my downstairs neighbour's yard... Fucking anti-social pigs.

Late arvo I walked in to town to meet some friends for dinner. I noticed the little house in the middle. It's an odd set of houses.

Guinness was good for me :-)

And so was the cottage pie!

Remy, Martijn and Mara. Patricia refused to be photographed. Must be a women thing...
We had a nice dinner and had ice cream for dessert and then one more drink somewhere else.

Patricia's birthday party

I saw the first snow this morning. It didn't stay.

Then I made a little present for my friend Patricia who's birthday gig was this evening.

In my mail I found a Christmas card from my friends Angeli and Ruud in Australia. Thanks guys!

I met Patricia at the bar of Bazar, where the dinner was.

It looks like it used to be a synagogue but I'm not sure.

It probably says "Finish you damn plate!" or something...

The little gathering.

Mara and Patricia.

Bazar.

To concert or not to concert?

ZZ Top ZZ Top ZZ Top ZZ Top! And the Doobie brothers too, legendary stuff. I think I wanna go but it's almost in Germany... Have to see.

I had dinner with Stephen, Nicole, Michelle and Daan. Crazy Wendy was serving us. Lovely girl but... bit crazy ;-)

The soccer banner at Dan Murphy's. Ireland not happy about how France qualified against them. Well, so they should because it was disgraceful.

Every bread you take.

A very large Wisteria (also called "Blue rain" in The NL) on our way in to town.

Eileen and I had breakfast at a lovely breakfast place (Vlaamsch broodhuys - Eerste Constantijn Huygensstraat)

It was completely full. The food we had was delicious but they had run out of croissants which was a great pity coz I really wanted one...

Their ad.

In the evening we went to one of Jon's Daiquiri parties. George (far right) was in charge of the fires. He likes being in charge of the fires ;-)

Marjolein in front of the lamp that was brought outside.

It was all just a dream...

In the morning Nicole and I drove the train to Amsterdam. This is a free news paper that exists in several countries but not in Australia. I love this news paper.

Second class compartments had not changed a bit. Neither had the people.

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When we walked out of Amsterdam Central Station it felt like we had never left. It was weird. It had been two years but it felt like we came back from a two week vacation. It was unreal.

The gypsies still play beautiful tunes.

Tram 25 that used to take us to our house before we moved.

Central Station.

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We met Suzanne at the station and we walked in to town. It was great seeing the Amsterdam canals again.

Suzanne at Zen's lunchroom. It was fantastic to meet her again.

Nicole and the Zen lady.

Gerrit joined us as well. The gang of four was complete again.

Temperatures were a little bit different than in Adelaide but the Guinness kept me warm.

Eh! Selecta!

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In the evening we met lots of friends at Mulligans. It was fantastic to see everybody again. Unfortunately you can't talk a lot on these kinds of occasions so I will have to catch up with people separately as well over time :-)

Sydney day 3.

This was last night. It's the office accross from our hotel room.

We walked in to town hunting down breakfast. There was a big waterfall fountain.

I had baked beans on toast. Very yummy. Oh, the toasted ham/cheese croissant was also very nice.

After that we took the bus down to Bronte beach to meet friends.

The friends were delayed and we waited in the park infront of the beach.

Kelly, Sanna and Miranda.

Bronte beach.

Back in town.

I saw a miner bird.

And an Ibis.

We took a break in town.

And then we visited the Sydney aquarium, which was a little dissapointing except for my chat with the sea turtle. I loved the sea turtle :-) He kept hanging around. I think he was looking at me.

It started to get dark when we emerged from the aquarium. We walkeed for an hour trying to find a pizzeria. Eventually we found a very nice one too but we were exhausted from all the walking we did. My feet are swearing at me.

I had a bath when we came home. Just to remember how it was. Well, I didn't fit length wise, lots of me stuck out of the water and got cold and my book got wet. I think thaat was enough bath tub action for the next 10 years.

The BBQ

We went to Richard and Debbie's place today for a BBQ and some trivial pursuit.

Since everybody brought something to be cooked we ended up with a large variety of meat. This is about a quarter of what we had...

Max the dog was keeping an eye out...

Max and Greg having a smoke.

From left to right: Mel, Debbie, Alex, Nicole and Gianna.

Richard taking his shot during a game of pool.

Alex, Richard and Debbie.

Gianna, Greg, Toni and Alex.

Mel and Jules.

We had a fun afternoon until we had to leave to feed the birds. When we left it was pissing down with rain but we made it home safe and sound, and also half frozen by the way...