Dinners And Alcohol, Do We Have A Problem?

Noa stayed the whole month of January with us in London. This was wonderful in many ways.

She went to a bartender course to learn all the stunts and tricks with bottles but also to learn how to make 66 different cocktails! Every day they had theory of the different types of alcohol, like whiskey, rum, vodka etcetera. She left our house 08:30 in the morning and came back in between 4-5pm. Every day they had a test of what they’ve done the day before. You need to know the exact amount of all the ingredients of every cocktail by heart. A lot of studying needed to be done by Noa and in the evening she could practice and make a few cocktails for us, we love cocktails. As you all know; Noa really likes studying and books, ;-)

Her exam week took 5 days, one day was for pouring exam, another day for the flairs, one day for writing out all 66 cocktails recipes, the last but not least; making 12 cocktails in 12 minutes and one day theory of all the ingredients. She passed her exams with 86%, we’re so proud of her. She really enjoyed it!

After this she went on a deserved holiday to Tunisia with three Tunisian friends from Qatar.

In the meantime, she was still looking for a job anywhere on our planet. She learned quickly she didn’t get into the countries where a visa was needed including the UK. This was of course very disappointing, but she changed directions and focused on Europe and middle East, Qatar, Dubai, Abu Dhabi. Suddenly the job interviews came one after the other. She had too many choices, her head was spinning! She has accepted a job at the Hilton in Rotterdam and started working Tuesday after Easter, April 11th.

At the moment she lives in our house with Jack and Ailsa in Zoeterwoude-dorp. Normally she would travel from Leiden to Rotterdam by train but beginning of April in Voorschoten (where I was born and raised) there was a huge train accident. Two trains, a freight train and a passenger train crashed onto a crane that was working on the rail track during the night. Luckily it was 03:30 in the morning, therefore not a full train, nevertheless many people got injured, a few very severe and the man who was working on the crane passed away. These kinds of huge collisions hardly ever happen in the Netherlands. Experts are still working to clear the train track between Leiden and Den Haag.

Just after our Austria trip I saw my bestie from Vienna, my Swedish friend Ulrika, my rock during long chemo sessions back in 2017, always sitting next to me, talking to me to distract me. Both her children live in London, she was here for a visit and so we had lunch at the Victoria, a beautiful pub just around the corner of our house. So pleased seeing her again!

Half of February we took the train to Plymouth in Devon, Shelley and Gary were waiting for us at the train station. They live in Saltash, close to Plymouth, but Saltash is Cornwall. First we explored Plymouth, a lovely city, but you could see buildings from the 50ties and 60ties, apparently they were heavily bombed during the Second World War. The area around the harbour is just lovely. Of course we had fish and chips. The weather was a bit poor, but what can you expect half of February.

In the evening we went to a lovely Chinese/Thai restaurant, we saw Zoe and her boyfriend, we had a lovely night with good food and company. The next day we went to the seaside in Cornwall. We had a long walk on the beach with Cuna, Shelley and Gary's dog. We had lunch outside and around 3pm we took the train back to London.

At the end of March Jack helped his little brother Hugo again with moving out of Luxembourg back to St Gallen in Switzerland. Ailsa and Zara were waiting for Jack somewhere in Belgium, they had a few days together. Hugo needs to finish his studies, only his thesis and two more subjects to do. At the end of June, I’ve promised Hugo to help him moving out of St Gallen. We will then put first all his stuff in our house in Austria, and from there we’ll see who can bring it wherever he’s going to. He had a fantastic time at the European Parliament and he will definitely try to find a job there, but first things first and that is his study.

Empty supermarkets is something you expect anywhere but not in the UK, at least I didn't! Due to Brexit import regulations and transportation troubles we had many empty shelfs in supermarkets. We couldn't get any tomatoes, lettuces, cucumbers, eggs and many more items. The butcher in the supermarket had nothing to display, it was so weird to see this. Luckily it did't affect the alcohol section.

At the end of February Ard and Louise came to London. We’ve missed them during our Christmas break at Don Papa. Now they came to London. We went to see the Jersey Boys. Somehow something went wrong with the tickets that Louise purchased, they were sold to other people…. We bought new tickets and had a bit awkward seat, in a loge, where we had to look around a corner. Luckily the music was fabulous. We took Ard and Louise to our favorite bar, it’s called Lady of the Grapes. It’s tiny, you have to make a reservation, but it’s really nice. It’s a French bar, with little snacks and great wines. On Sunday we went to the florwer market, I like the vibe there. Time flew by when they were here, always good to be together.

On march 1st I went with Cinzia to Cambridge to see Sue Ray there, both are friends from our Munich years. We took the train from Liverpool station. It’s only an hour and 10 minutes away from London. I took Ayo because Rob was in Edinburgh. Cambridge is very calm and peaceful compared to London. We had a great time and had lunch at the Six restaurant, it’s at the Varsity Hotel in Cambridge, a roof top restaurant with a great view from all sides over Cambridge. Rob and I were in Cambridge when I was pregnant with Robin, that’s 30 years ago! It hasn’t changed a bit.

On the train Cinzia and I were chatting of course, it turned out that Friday evening when we had dinner with Ard and Louise in Portobello Road in Notting Hill, we were in the same restaurant at the same time and we didn’t see each other! The reason was or is, it’s a funny place, it’s an Asian Pub, Ukai. We once had a few drinks there with Jack on a Sunday afternoon, and it was great, therefore I thought let’s go back with Ard and Louise. Well, it wasn’t a good idea. The place it extremely dark at night, we had to use our torch on our phones to read the menu and there’s a DJ who’s mixing three music styles, very loud! We could not talk to each other…. That’s probably also the reason that we didn’t see Neil and Cinzia, dark and noisy! Great food though.

A week later Cisca came to London and I dragged her to the Lady of the Grapes again, afterwards we saw Wicked, what a great show this was! We also went to Tate Modern, that's very impressive. The weather was chilly and sometimes it poured a bit. We also found the house of her father's last post as an ambassador of the Netherlands. A massive mansion just behind Kensington Palace.

Our house in Austria, Don Papa, will look differently soon, we hope. It took us a year to get all the approvals and paperwork done for an extension of our balcony in order to make a bigger terrace. They’ve promised to start mid-May and finished hopefully beginning of June.

Fingers crossed.

On March 11th we flew from Stansted to Klagenfurt, Klagenfurt is only 50 minutes away from our house. That sounds great, right? But unfortunately, we had to take a bus, two hours to Graz, where we have our car. Although Robin had a busy weekend, she was so sweet she c brought the car to Graz Central Station, then she took the train back to her house, which took her another hour. We waited a little bit for Sanneke, my sister-in-law, she flew from Rotterdam to Graz. Together we drove back to our house and past the airport of Klagenfurt about 6 hours later than the arrival of our plane again. We did some shopping in Feldkirchen and came home at the end of the day. The weather was gorgeous! Sanneke is teaching me how to make nice photographs. She’s a photographer. I had to make 7 photos to show what Austria means to me. I will show you the photos below.

I also had my yearly checkups in Vienna, and I can stay away for another year! Whoop whoop!! We had a wonderful week with Sanneke and Robin who also came along with her dog Daisy. Sanneke just lost her best friend Carolien, the funeral was the day before she travelled. On March 6th we lost a dear friend Marloes from our Warsaw years, her funeral was on Tuesday when we were in Austria. We could see it online; I was grateful that this was possible.

A few weeks ago, I saw Brenda in London. We haven’t seen each other for a couple of years. Brenda and I walked miles through London. After lunch I saw Bill shortly. We will see them in April in Warwickshire where they live. This way we'll see another part of England.

Two weeks ago, I went up north again to see Rob in Edinburgh. He had a dinner planned with a few team members and there were two consultants, one I know well, Maud. It was great to see her and Edinburgh again. Ayo is such a great travel companion. 4,5 hours on the train it’s all fine for him. Dogs are rarily allowed in restaurants or shops in the UK. We have now developed a strategy to avoid not being allowed in. Ayo has his own dog backpack where we put him in and then we take him into the restaurant. Nobody realizes it is a dog backpack and then we put him under the table. He is always very quiet and happy as long as he's with us. Often somewhere during dinner the waiter/waitress realizes we have a dog with us, but then it is too late. They have the option to kick us out and we would have a free meal or let us stay. When we were in Edinburgh, we went out the first night to a really great restaurant called Maison Bleu and our trick worked out great again. When they discovered during dinner Ayo however, he got the Royal Treatment. He got his own small plate and was served Haggis Balls, which he really loved. When we had dinner with Rob’s collegues in Edinburgh we did the backpack trick again and it worked again. But somewhere during dinner we allowed him on the couch in between us. Every time the waiter came, he said; "I do not see a dog, I do not see a dog …."

Rob has now finally been able to visit the brewery sites in the UK. His last visit was to Tadcaster, which is close to York. It was a fantastic location in a very authentic looking brewry from the outside. They had a roadshow with the Management Team for all the people working on site. And afterwards got a very nice brewery tour. He really liked the brewery site. He is still travelling a lot and sometimes it is annoying him, due to the continuous reappearing strikes. He prefers to fly from London City Airport which is a small airport in the city directly on the Thames. But one day going there early in the morning he looked outside the window of the underground and thought it might be snowing, what we call wet snow, which is snow that does not stay on the ground but turns directly into water. The result was that all flights from London City were cancelled for 4 hours …. As you know we lived in Finland and we know how snow looks like and how they manage it at the airports in Finland.

At the end of March Patrick and Nastiya (from Nigeria/Azerbaijan) came to visit us in London. We tried out some new places, some were nice, some less good.

But Rob and Noa have found THE BEST PLACE, it’s called Pawsitive and it’s a restaurant for dog and their owners. They have a special menu for dogs. Patrick did not believe it until Ayo was served on his golden tray a meal with broccoli, salmon, eggs and carrots. In no time it was gone. Unfortunately, we had to wait bit longer, but the whole atmosphere was just great. There’s a rocking chair for the dogs, there’s a ball pit and there are many, many dogs.

At night we went to a tapas restaurant, this was more a bar where you could get tapas.

This weekend with Mr and Mrs van Uden was just great. It was so good to see them again.

Answering the question in our title; "no, we don't have a problem, we just embrace life in a world that's extremely unstable at the moment." "Life's what you make it, is it not?"

Next blog will be about our short trip to Iceland and a wonderful weekend in Warwickshire with Bill and Brenda and probably many more things we did or have seen in the meantime. #neveradullmoment

#Staysafeeveryone