Sunday, May 17, 2015 in Groningen, NL

Goedemorgen!

Sunday 5/17/2015 9 AM

Traveled well, flights were great (left MKE at 11:50 AM Friday 5/15 and arrived in Amsterdam at 5:30 AM 5/16), good weather, good flights, excellent service (Delta/KLM), and no issues. Didn't sleep much.

Drove the roughly 120 miles to Groningen (Jaap picked me up in his car) and then spent most of the day at his Lawn and Tennis Club as they had an annual tournament going on. The airline had been desperate to get seven people to get bumped off--Susie (Susie Lynch, Communication Skills Instructor and on the exchange too, but at a different school) and I checked into it, but decided not to as we would have gotten in at noon on Saturday. Which would have been a disaster as Jaap had traveled on Friday to spend the night in a hotel to pick me up and not have to get up at 3 AM to make the trip to get me! (I am going to take the train back when I leave on the 30th.)

Made the daily trip to the grocery store, by bike (bikes are allowed to go against car traffic rules--wrong way on one-way streets, etc.) and then had a nice home cooked meal. Jaap's condo is the fourth from right and then third one up. Very nice and comfortable and close to the city, but quiet. The grocery store is a daily excursion. Of course smaller packages and smaller refrigerators.

 This picture below is the front door (and underground parking for the condos).

 

This is a very interesting architectural building, just on the outskirts of Groningen. Very curvy lines to the whole building.

This is the group of tennis players, from left: Tineke, Karst, Dennis, and Molly (sp?). Across the table (never met him or her--they were on the visiting team), and then Monique, and Jaap (or Jacob formal name), my host.

Tineke is a speech therapist and had a wonder vacation last summer in the US west, camping for several weeks at such places as Zion National Park.  Karst has worked from home for the last 14 years translating mysteries and thrillers from English to Dutch, such as Danielle Steele. Monica is a primary school teacher and has a full-time job for Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday. Someone else teaches on Thursday and Friday. They only have a 7 week summer break for the students--the staff comes back in 6 weeks. They have about 7 or 8 weeks to go until break.

We will be going at noon today to pick up some beer and crisps for a birthday party that Jaap is hosting. It is quite common for people to have a party annually and invite co-workers, family, and friends. It will be held at a hotel that Jaap's friend owns and the food will be catered in. Should be 30 to 50 people.

Here is the draw bridge opening up (big black thing on the left side) there are several canals in the city center and the sailboat (you can see the mast) going through. There were three boats ( back of boats in the picture on right) that went through and then the nice bridge operator, locked the door and rode off on his bike, probably to open another bridge at an appointed time. There are also lots of house boats, so that may clutter the picture for you.