A mixed bag

Signs I am still part Amsterdammer:

- I ask for mayonnaise to go with my chips
- I look the wrong way when crossing the road
- I say 'gezondheid' when someone near me sneezes

Signs I am starting to settle back in:

- all the tea I am drinking, no more coffee, it's too watery here
- I've caught myself saying 'euros'
- I'm already grumbling about public transport

It's four weeks tomorrow since I moved. Still so many things to see and do and try, still so many things I miss. A friend told me on the phone earlier tonight that she's been back since October and is still struggling to settle - I am hoping it won't take me quite as long.

Televisual

Amsterdam, 2003-2007: Bugger all on TV. Especially not Scrubs. Maybe three new episodes viewed "legally"; the rest acquired "by other means".

Dublin, tonight, 9pm: Four different episodes of Scrubs ON FOUR DIFFERENT CHANNELS.

a) I wish we had a PVR and
b) it's good to be home.

Details

The rest of the apartment is still awash with boxes and tools and unhung pictures, but we're getting there... slowly.

Oh yes, I'm really this much of a nerd

At gate. Using wireless that costs EUR6 for half an hour. Chatting with Amsterfriends online as if nothing has changed. But oh boy it has. See you on the other side!

36 hours to go

Still to do:

- cancel gym membership
- hawk bags of clothes to charity bins
- attempt to cram a large suitcase's worth of clothes into a teeny tiny suitcase
- attend wedding of one of the first people I met here
- one last Sunday breakfast

It's happening!

Packing. Eugh.

Only four boxes done so far and they already exceed my body weight. Where did all this stuff come from? And I haven't even started on the clothes and shoes yet...

Update: the final total weight = 135kg. That's two of me! Two of me!

Bad timing

Yesterday I realised one of my worst Amsterdam fears and fell down half a flight of the very steep stairs that lead to my apartment. I was in a hurry to get out and was rocking out to my ipod when I misjudged one step and found myself careening down the remaining half flight from the 3rd to the 2nd floor. I managed to put my right arm out and grabbed the bannister, which brought me to a halt on the bottom step without having hit my head. Unfortunately I seem to have now pulled every muscle in my right arm (making even typing this tricky), which, considering the amount of lifting and hawking my next days will involve, is nothing short of crap timing. I've got about ten bags of rubbish ready for the weekly pickup tonight already, and I haven't even started on the top floor of the apartment yet. Two nurofen now and a hot bath later will help - I hope!

I quit

I just cycled home from work for the last time, laden down with three bags full of presents (some so thoughtful! like the copy of Everything Worth Knowing from one guy who heard me talk about The Devil Wears Prada exactly once, and the stroopwafels! so many stroopwafels!) I'd finished up by about 3 and spent the rest of the afternoon surfing the internet and chatting. I've learned more about some of my colleagues in the past month than in the previous three and a half years - I think handing in my notice flipped an honesty switch somewhere, and now people feel they can say anything to me because I'm leaving anyway (and to be fair, vice versa, I've let rip on more than one occasion this past month).

I still think it hasn't quit hit me that I am now unemployed (albeit only for a week) - mainly because I have nothing to compare this whole job-quitting malarkey to. There is a huge difference between walking out the door at the end of a three week temp assignment and handing in one's security badge featuring an almost unrecognisable photo of oneself taken at the age of 22. I think it'll only really hit me on Monday morning when I wake up and realise that there is no job to go to, and moreover that I have two days to sort and pack my worldly belongings before Fedex arrive.

In the meantime, I have a weekend full o' fun ahead, with the highlight (hopefully) being my leaving do tomorrow night, where the theme will be Come Dressed As A Song Title. A full recap and photos will follow! In the meantime, tell me what you would come as...

Getting down to the nitty gritty

I've been so busy enjoying myself over the past week I've done exactly no work on the really important stuff I need to sort before I move. Instead, I've been drinking in the park, swing dancing in public and staying up until 2am arsing about on the internet. I think I've hit a second wave of denial about leaving. My friend Franco, recently repatriated to Toronto, said this to me earlier:

"You are really, really, really going to miss amsterdam. after i came back i would lie in bed and i could feel myself riding my bike along the canals. never had a connection like that with any city before."

I've also spent a fair bit of this week talking all things Amsterdam with another friend, who had a potential offer of a transfer to San Francisco and was going through actual physical distress at the thought of leaving here. It's made me think about the effect Amsterdam has on people - it's a kind of Neverland playground for expats where real world rules don't apply. No mortgages, no rat race, no real responsibility, no fixed plans. Spontaneity, relaxation and ridiculously short bike commutes are the order of the day. It's all so easy - who wouldn't want to stay forever?

Except, it's dawned on me over the past few months that there's more to life than easy. Being in a second stint of long distance with Oran hasn't been easy. Missing my family hasn't been easy. Growing apart from friends through a pure lack of proper catch up time hasn't been easy. And as much as I've settled in here, and as much as I'm slightly scared of settling in somewhere new, somewhere less utopic, I think the payoff makes it all worthwhile. Come three weeks from now, I may be crammed on a tram during rush hour instead of sauntering through the park on my bike, but, when it comes down to it, I will be home.

Sob

So much for the moussaka. The boyos are not moving in now after all. There is a third boyo so they have decided to go looking for three bedroom apartments.

Back to square one for me...

Baby steps

One of my main worries about leaving here has been to find replacement tenants for my apartment. (I say "one of" because the main worry I've had here for the past week has been the nightmares, including The One Where The Strange Guy Grabs Me By The Neck and The One Where I Get Blown Up In A Car On The Family Farm). Anyway, I'd figured I would have to place an ad on some expat website to find people to take over my lease in July, but it now seems that two friends may be up for taking it on.

Anyway, one of said prospective new tenants is Greek Aussie and he decided he'd give my kitchen a trial run this afternoon by making moussaka from scratch. I, of course, couldn't say no, seeing as he was MAKING MOUSSAKA FROM SCRATCH (using his mother's recipe, bell book and candle, and I mean he was following detailed step by step instructions from an excel spreadsheet he had created the last time he watched his mammy make moussaka). Score on both fronts, it would seem, and I am hoping for confirmation from him and the other new tenant in the coming couple of days, which would be a Very Major Tick on the List Of Very Practical And Boring Things I Have To Do Before I Go, So Boring In Fact That I Haven't Blogged About It.

Photos of the moussaka and consumers thereof over in yonder sidebar - it was bloody gorgeous.

Little miss worst case scenario

It turns out I had nothing to worry about! The apartment is no longer in the red light - the ladies of the night moved west when the tram lines went in on the street outside two years ago. So now all we're looking at is a great apartment on a lovely street well within our price range and with absolutely everything we could want including two big bedrooms and a south facing balcony.

So, we're taking it. Done deal! It feels like we've been on a wheel of good fortune for the past two weeks and turning this down in favour of shopping around would cause all sorts of karmic anger. Not that we could turn this down, mind. So hello Dublin 7!

Now to important things like finding a decent local and the nearest Tesco...

And so it begins

Oran viewed our first potential apartment in Dublin this evening. It has some very firm pros - great decor, not too pricey, parking space, and most importantly owned by a friend of my sister's so we know we're not getting a bum deal. HowEVER, it's on a street best known for its late night kerb crawling activity and less than ideal for my commute to work. What to do...? We are both extremely inexperienced as far as renting in Dublin goes - the market has shifted completely since we last lived there five years ago. Part of me is reluctant to sign up with shady agencies (they're all somewhat shady, no denying it), but if it meant getting a place closer to work... Plus we're up against some pretty tough timelines - I start work on July 9th and am facing into a three hour round trip commute from a sofa bed at my parents' place if we don't have something sorted out by then. Right now we're keeping everything crossed, but as I type the one and only decent rental website is down and I am taking that as a sign.

In the meantime I am planning ticks for some of the boxes on the list below, the first being tomorrow when I embark on my last booze cruise round the canals. The weather is (hopefully) set to stay in its current tropical state, which should make for three hours of bliss. If it rains I'm not sure if I'll have a chance to reschedule - here's hoping the weather and apartment gods get together tonight for a pep talk.

The to-do list

I should probably be spending more time on making more critical lists like Things I Need To Cancel and Things I Need To Ship Home, but this one is much more fun. I'm hoping to knock as much as possible off this list in the next four and a half weeks, with a little help from my friends.

Bars

( ) Wijnand Fockink (Best Bar Name Ever)
( ) Nemo roof terrace bar (one of the loveliest views over the city and, in my opinion, best experienced on a scorching hot sick day)
( ) Gollem and De Zotte (mmm Belgian beer)
( ) 't Arendsnest (mmm Dutch beer)

Restaurants

( ) Vooges
( ) Garlic Queen
( ) Nieuwmarkt fondue place
( ) Malaysian cafe place
( ) Gusto (purely for the pasta in the parmesan wheel)

Other

( ) BBQ on my balcony
( ) Karaoke night
( ) Disco bowling at Knijn
( ) Booze cruise (set for this Friday, everyone invited!)
( ) Games night
( ) Club Rascal

Four and a half weeks to go...!

Drumroll please

So yes. Big news. Today I accepted an offer of a new job in Dublin and quit my job here. I finish up on June 29th and move home on July 8th.

It doesn't seem so big when it's laid out like that. But big it is! It's been some time coming but I am still shocked at how quickly things have progressed. Oran's been at home for a year now and I've said all along that I wanted to move home - just not without a job. Little did I know that I would get the very first one I applied for within two weeks of applying, and little did I know that it would be quite so amazingly brilliant as it sounds. In short, I couldn't have asked for more.

That said, I am gutted to be leaving Amsterdam. I had a minor meltdown in the middle of Nieuwmarkt yesterday evening as the enormity of it all hit me. I have been very lucky to have had the chance to live in such a beautiful city for most of my working life. I'm going to miss cycling to work with my ipod blaring, drinking and playing cards in the park on muggy summer evenings, deep fried bar snacks and a million and one other little things (I'm going to have to make a list, I think of something new every other minute). Most of all though, I've made some stellar friends here who've seen me through a lot and are going to be very hard to leave behind.

But, all good things must come to an end, and there are surely more good things to come. I can't wait to settle in to Dublin life again - it's a different city to the one I left five years ago. I can't wait to catch up properly with old friends I've been snatching snippets of conversation with on my all too short trips home. I can't wait to be close to family again and be able to pop up the road for a Sunday afternoon if the mood takes me. And most of all I can't wait to settle into all of this with Oran. I'm moving on up now... but first, I have a five week leaving party to plan. I'm going to make a list for that, too.

Ahem

Major news alert. More tomorrow.

(And no, I'm not pregnant!)

Shiny

I am writing this from my new MacBook. I may never leave the house again.

Big exciting thing number one

I suppose I can talk about this now - it is happening in two weeks after all.

Flatmate Jenny is leaving. She's got a kickass job back in the UK and flies out on June 4th. I'm gutted to see her go, of course - she's become one of those friends I can't imagine not knowing, which is amazing considering I've only known her a year. Funny thing about living abroad, that - friendships seem to forge faster, which I suppose is because we're all in the same boat and a tiny bit desperate to meet new people. I imagine it's what dating feels like (having *cough cough* extremely limited knowledge in that particular area). On the other hand, in a place like Amsterdam, people come and go all the time, and it's an odd thing to have to adjust to. I didn't think it affected me much - we've had a spate of people leaving in the last year - but I think Jenny's probably the first really good friend I have here who's left. (I'm not counting Oran here, as I still get to see him regularly and we are actively planning to live in the same country again at some point in the future.)

It's going to be a busy couple of weeks between leaving parties and helping her pack and cooking a huge farewell dinner. The end of an all too short era, for sure. I'm still trying to sort out a replacement for her, but I'll probably be rattling around the apartment on my own for a couple of weeks after she goes, which hopefully won't push me over the edge...

Evolution

Not only have I now mastered the Dutch art of cycling while holding an umbrella, I can now reach in my bag, root round for the umbrella, squirrel it out of its cover and put it up, all without stopping my bike. Handy.

Surprise, surprise

The weekend went just as well as I'd hoped. Surprise 1: a guest from Amsterdam in the form of Ben. We didn't get quite the squealing reaction I'd hoped for, but that's partly because Oran's not really the squealing type and partly because he waited outside in the car so we had to knock on the window instead of bursting into the arrivals hall all jazz hands like. Anyway, good surprise, I had nothing to worry about, hurrah hurrah.

Surprise 2 turned out to be fun for all involved - we got in the car on Saturday morning and I told Oran to drive to Malahide marina. A bunch of his family and two of my sisters met us there for a Sea Safari around Dublin Bay. It was rip roaring fun - we were thrown around the waves in a giant rubber dinghy for an hour, taking in Ireland's Eye and Howth harbour along the way. We rounded off the day with a huge Thai meal in Malahide, and a beer tasting/beer drinking fest in Porterhouse North, where the two sets of parents met for the first time (oo-er) and much delicious fruity beer was consumed. Not too shabby.

It was weird having my own birthday bash this year - ours are so close we've had a joint night out for the past five years. This year, though, Julia booked a table for 10 at a really pretty restaurant, and we proceeded to eat rings round some delicious steak and frites and white chocolate mousse, among other things. Lots of lovely presents, too, including Yahtzee (yay!) and a very pretty summer dress (woo!) I completely forgot how wrecked I was from the red eye flight I took back here on Monday morning.

And now, I'm 26, and the week goes on. Lots of exciting things happening round these parts. All (well, some) will be revealed soon...