Hello Amsterdam!

I am a little overwhelmed now, to say the least. Maybe I've just been travelling a wee bit too much in the past month, but arriving in Amsterdam with -2 degrees Celsius weather (at MID-DAY!) was a bit of a shock on this tropical girl's system. I caught myself yelling in my head "WHAT HAVE I DONE?!?"

They say it will snow again tomorrow. Whatever, there's already snow on the ground from the last time it snowed, whenever that was! This is the view from the car driving into the city:


Grey and bleak and everything you imagine winter should be. HAHAHA.

Bear in mind for the past 3 years when I lived in Cape Town and Sydney, the winters in both places is laughably warm in comparison. I mean, I think the coldest it would ever get was about 10 or 12 degress Celsius. And this is talking about the ODD day in winter when it would be "THAT cold".

For the first 4 days, I'll be staying in a hotel until I can move into the corporate apartment. (I can't wait to finally unpack my bag and put everything away into a closet. I have literally been living out of a suitcase for a couple of weeks now). European hotels have a notorious reputation for being... er... how shall I put it: CRAP. I mean - they're just older, smaller... and generally don't have the modern amenities that newer hotels have. (And may I remind you, I'm Asian. Modern amenities are important to us.)

BUT... by European standards, the place I'm in is pretty... er... "flash", I suppose? But Hey! I have free wifi access! How rare is that in Europe!! (OK OK, I'll stop making fun now)

The first thing I did when I stepped in the room was ask myself: WHERE CAN I PRACTICE? ...I guess the little strip of red carpet next to the bed will have to do for tomorrow morning's practice. (Yes, I know it's the new moon, but I've only practiced ONCE all of last week, so I'm determined to get a proper practice in tomorrow).



By the way, as Claudia mentioned in the previous comments... yes, there really isn't any authorized/ certified teacher in all of the Netherlands. I have spent the past few days Google-mapping like crazy, and somehow mysore-style Ashtanga classes don't seem to have caught on here. (If you're a yoga teacher, maybe you can build your niche here!)

Amsterdam is really pretty though. I'm right by one of the canals. This is the view out of my window.


And walking around the old city centre, it reminded me of those porcelain Dutch houses that my mum used to collect (a lot of them were given by KLM airlines. HAHA.) It's really surreal, walking around and seeing these Dutch houses FOR REAL.



It's almost 4pm and er... the sky is getting dark. This reminds me of when I went to university in Boston and those miserably short winter days. (ARRGHHHHH! WHAT HAVE I DONE?!?)

For now, I must get ready to meet a friend who will be showing me around this place. Laters!