expect the unexpected

I take a deep breath after this cliche title, reminiscence of the advertising era which now seems like stone age, and i will explain what i wanted to say.
what i like about my life now is that you never know what every day can bring you. today, for example, we went to a hospital to make a 82 year old lady feel remembered and she was very happy. then we saw another old lady, this time dead (poor her) and we left her some flowers that she doesn't need anymore. the latter happened in chimay, in southern belgium, where the trappist monks brew the so famous beer. after that we had a picnic near a lake, we visited the beautiful and oh so quiet chimay abbey and we even saw a monk :)
we're exhausted, but not bad for a working day

Violently happy

Violently also because my noble behind is very hurt, after the 20 km bicycle ride today. And I am expecting some muscle pains tomorrow.
It all happened in Zeeland, Netherlands and it was a really nice week-end. With camping, sun, sea, bicycles. No photos unfortunately cause I had my hands busy.
Some facts:
- if you arrive in the wrong camping, a night can cost you 50 euros. Common, I bring my own bed! We paid 15 in a so called mini camping. The mini campings are the ones owned by farmers on their lands. Very decent and clean.
- cycling in Netherlands is a bliss. Cycling routes are everywhere: near the road, in the middle of the crop fields, in the forest, near the sea. So it was worth the pain I feel now.
- being a Romanian can make people suspicious. The camping lady said an "oops" when hearing our nationality and then gave us not a very good camping spot. The guy renting the bikes was very concerned whether we'll bring back the bikes and he expressed his relief and surprise when we returned: "Wow, you're back". Then he became very friendly. It is unpleasant to see these kind of reactions, but what a hell, maybe we'll change their opinion. One by one.

My window garden

One by one, small pots have appeared on my window sill: mint, basil, persil, orange, tomato. They were mostly bought to be freshly used for cooking. But after using them they continued growing new leaves, so apparentely they liked it here. The basil has nice smelly white flowers, the orange has oranges, the mint has become wild and the tomato is three times taller than when I bought it. Jack and his beanstalk can be really jealous. And the tomato has recently made flowers and small fruits. Soon I will be able to make a window grown tomato and basil salad.
It's not bad to have a garden, even if it's only on your window.

Belgian separatism

We've been hearing all these rumours about being very hard to adapt in Flemish areas if you don't speak the language. So we asked a Flemish guy about this and his answer came bluntly "As long as you don't speak French, it's ok".
Thanks God our French is lousy :)

Dreamology

Strange dreams lately
The weirdest was with me just having given birth to a baby. I was very relaxed, so I put the baby in the bed and went for a walk. After a few hours of walking I started to panic as I realised I left a one day old baby alone in a bed. And that I don't know what to do with it. And that I didn't buy anything, no preparations at all, no diapers, no clothes, nothing. And panic panic panic. And I woke up.
Another one was with, again, a baby. His body with my head on it, it looked very weird.
And another one was with some yellow peppers. So the very next day I went to the market and bought some peppers, as I was really craving.
Now, let's not analyse anything.

I made it on the cover :)

If you are in Brussels, don't miss this month's The Bulletin, because we're in it :D We were invited to represent Romania in this issue dedicated to Europe. And the results are in these badly taken pictures, so you'll have to guess a lot.
Who finds the other monkey on the cover gets a juicy prize!
Enjoy!

wondering

What did people do in the evenings when TV and computers didn't exist?
I remember my parents (as when they were young the TV program lasted for only a few hours) meeting a lot with their friends. They were talking and playing cards. Sometimes they were even dancing.
Now we are coming at home and the first thing to do is turn on the TV. In our case, it's the computer, each his/hers.
We'll all die strangled by cables.

33

almost a record for belgium and indeed a very hot day, especially when you are driving around all day long.
as you can see, I love weather reports :)