Okay - can we say DRAINED?! I mean, I've been having a great time... but that Staatsexamen is just like taking an IB or an AP. You know the content and you can do it, but you have to focus so hard that you feel sooo mentally drained afterwards...
Anyway, backing up. Yesterday was Thursday and we all know what that means... Shania day! So I went straight from school to the station and picked up Martin, and we went back to my apartment and bummed around for a while, looking at pictures and stuff, then went back to the station, grabbed some Burger King (how healthy of us) and sat there having one of those 'alles en nog wat' conversations... about portion sizes in America, how you could 'tell' if someone was Dutch or not, etc. I think it ended when we were trying to guess the gender of the person at the next table, who was sitting with his/her head leaning on his/her hand, staring into space, looking like an absolute picture of depression... so we tentatively concluded that it was a woman, and I said, "No matter what 'it' is, 'it' doesn't look very happy," and Martin said, "Yeah... in a few minutes she's going to be under our train." LOL!
Anyway, so we took the train to Rotterdam and then the Metro to Ahoy, and got there just in time - the warm-up act started their first song just as we came out of the bathrooms. They were pretty good - two girls who had Swedish-sounding accents and sang ABBA knockoffs. Then the lights came on and the camera guys climbed up to their positions and finally the real show started. She opened with "Man! I Feel Like a Woman!" but after that I lost track. Anyway, it was a good show - I still like most of her old stuff better than most of her new stuff, but nonetheless she did very well. She dressed a little more 'normal' and didn't do as much of the 'sexy' dancing stuff as before, and it was really more enjoyable this way. She still has every single one of the same band members, and they're really just as much fun to watch as she is - hamming it up. I was also having a great time watching the man in front of me - one of those big guys with a belly who has one of those always-smiling faces - because he knew every single word to all of the Up! songs. Really amusing.
She changed clothes three or four times, the last time being jeans and an orange Oranje jersey. And at one point she disappeared and turned out to be sitting in the Tribune seating (behind us) and she sang "The Woman In Me" from that vantage point. We were in the fifth row - excellent seats, I might add - and everyone was standing on their chairs to get a better view. So I did the same, and a guard made me get down. But the girl right next to me - and the rest of the section - were allowed to remain on their chairs. So after he walked away I started yelling in Dutch about discrimination against the American - only half joking - LOL! Oh well, but when she ran back to the stage for "That Don't Impress Me Much", she ran right past me. So that's something...
Oh, and she signed my ticket - well, okay, so about twenty people were crushing up against the podium and waving tickets and mine happened to be one of the lucky ones that got under her pen, LOL. It's really just a squiggle, but I'm pretending it's an S... :)
Anyways, so the concert ended around eleven, and Martin stayed over since the trains wouldn't have been running long enough to get him the whole way home to Emmen - he would have been stranded in Zwolle. So he stayed in Utrecht and then the next morning - this morning - we went back to the station and went our separate ways... him to Emmen, me to Lunetten... and then the real work began...
...the Staatsexamen! Antoanete from Boswell had mentioned in a mail to me that she would be there, but there were a lot more than just her - Mirela was there too, and we also ran into Habib and Yana and Fereba and a couple of other people we knew. I was in the same room as A and M for the first part, the reading, but for the afternoon part (listening) we were split up. Anyway, the reading was pretty easy - not eeeeeeaaaasy easy, but it was just a question of taking the time to read carefully. I feel like I got pretty close to a perfect score on that section.
So then we had an hour-and-a-half break for lunch and M and A and I walked to Albert Heijn and bought a bunch of random stuff - bagels, cheese, orange juice, chocolate-covered peanuts - and had a picnic beside a canal, by the shopping center. LOL! It was cold, but gezellig. Antoanete was completely silly and jumpy and acting like a little kid - I couldn't stop laughing at her all day. When some people behave like that, it's annoying, but when she does it, you can't react in any way except laughter.
Then we went back to 'work' - split up into our different rooms and the listening began. Three parts, A, B, and (what else) C. There were actually two separate texts in A, and they were both very easy - I'm sure I got every answer right. But that was just lulling us into a false sense of security, because B totally kicked my @$$. But that was partly because I had a (very) full stomach and so I had that 'sleepy' feeling, and we had already done a long test that morning... I was having trouble concentrating. C was better, but I don't know if that's because I woke up again (they managed to break the CD player and have to go trawling for another one, giving us a breather) or because the text really was easier. We shall see.
Anyway, so then we were done and M and A and I - after a long discussion about whether or not strippenkaarten and abonnementen can be used in the trains - took the train back to Utrecht and went shopping in the station shopping centre (Hoog Catherijne). And I tried on so many shoes, but what IS it with the shoes here - either they're boots which are too tight for my legs, or they're completely flat shoes with absolutely no support on the bottoms. And I have 'picky feet'. So, to keep a long story short, I'm still looking...
So Antoanete left and Mirela and I walked around the V&D for a while, but then we ran into Laura - another girl from our Boswell class, but from C1. Apparently she'd taken the test today too, but I hadn't seen her. She and I had been good friends in C1, but we'd somehow lost each other's numbers. So then Mirela left and Laura and I went up to the top floor and got something to drink and chatted for a while - or, rather, she vented about work and I smiled and nodded and drank my strawberry whatever-it-was... really, she must have gone on for like twenty minutes straight, no exaggeration, and I was practically falling asleep...
So I finally managed to extract myself from her and I got on the bus and came home... and here I am, typing this entry in Word at 18.34 and waiting for the computer to 'realize' it has a connection so I can put it in Blogger for real.
Tomorrow: second day of Staatsexamen (speaking and writing)
Sunday: SLEEPING... oh yeah, and going to Linde's
Monday: 15u class, also have two translations and a mini-essay to do
Tuesday: 13u class, finish those assignments which I won't finish Monday
Wednesday: 9u class, then to Doetinchem (English lesson for Wim)
Thursday: 13u class (turn in mini-essay)
Friday: 11u class
...And that's as far as I know so far... hoping to squeeze a few more friends in there (Martin, Tristan, Lotte, and maybe the long shot David) but we shall see...
It's almost ER time... let's see if I can finagle getting the television...
P.S. I am allowed to do Renate Dorrestein for the translation, and the Dutch version of A Heart of Stone (Een hart van steen) got here yesterday. So now Mom and Dad's package just needs to get here... with the book and that cheese, mmm... you sent it one week ago today, so it shouldn't be long now... my guess is Wednesday... hope so!
P.P.S. Favorite song of the moment - "Eye of the Tiger" from the 'Rocky' soundtrack. Catie and David, my fellow understanders of the greatness of what makes a Driving Song... DL it!!!
Anyway, backing up. Yesterday was Thursday and we all know what that means... Shania day! So I went straight from school to the station and picked up Martin, and we went back to my apartment and bummed around for a while, looking at pictures and stuff, then went back to the station, grabbed some Burger King (how healthy of us) and sat there having one of those 'alles en nog wat' conversations... about portion sizes in America, how you could 'tell' if someone was Dutch or not, etc. I think it ended when we were trying to guess the gender of the person at the next table, who was sitting with his/her head leaning on his/her hand, staring into space, looking like an absolute picture of depression... so we tentatively concluded that it was a woman, and I said, "No matter what 'it' is, 'it' doesn't look very happy," and Martin said, "Yeah... in a few minutes she's going to be under our train." LOL!
Anyway, so we took the train to Rotterdam and then the Metro to Ahoy, and got there just in time - the warm-up act started their first song just as we came out of the bathrooms. They were pretty good - two girls who had Swedish-sounding accents and sang ABBA knockoffs. Then the lights came on and the camera guys climbed up to their positions and finally the real show started. She opened with "Man! I Feel Like a Woman!" but after that I lost track. Anyway, it was a good show - I still like most of her old stuff better than most of her new stuff, but nonetheless she did very well. She dressed a little more 'normal' and didn't do as much of the 'sexy' dancing stuff as before, and it was really more enjoyable this way. She still has every single one of the same band members, and they're really just as much fun to watch as she is - hamming it up. I was also having a great time watching the man in front of me - one of those big guys with a belly who has one of those always-smiling faces - because he knew every single word to all of the Up! songs. Really amusing.
She changed clothes three or four times, the last time being jeans and an orange Oranje jersey. And at one point she disappeared and turned out to be sitting in the Tribune seating (behind us) and she sang "The Woman In Me" from that vantage point. We were in the fifth row - excellent seats, I might add - and everyone was standing on their chairs to get a better view. So I did the same, and a guard made me get down. But the girl right next to me - and the rest of the section - were allowed to remain on their chairs. So after he walked away I started yelling in Dutch about discrimination against the American - only half joking - LOL! Oh well, but when she ran back to the stage for "That Don't Impress Me Much", she ran right past me. So that's something...
Oh, and she signed my ticket - well, okay, so about twenty people were crushing up against the podium and waving tickets and mine happened to be one of the lucky ones that got under her pen, LOL. It's really just a squiggle, but I'm pretending it's an S... :)
Anyways, so the concert ended around eleven, and Martin stayed over since the trains wouldn't have been running long enough to get him the whole way home to Emmen - he would have been stranded in Zwolle. So he stayed in Utrecht and then the next morning - this morning - we went back to the station and went our separate ways... him to Emmen, me to Lunetten... and then the real work began...
...the Staatsexamen! Antoanete from Boswell had mentioned in a mail to me that she would be there, but there were a lot more than just her - Mirela was there too, and we also ran into Habib and Yana and Fereba and a couple of other people we knew. I was in the same room as A and M for the first part, the reading, but for the afternoon part (listening) we were split up. Anyway, the reading was pretty easy - not eeeeeeaaaasy easy, but it was just a question of taking the time to read carefully. I feel like I got pretty close to a perfect score on that section.
So then we had an hour-and-a-half break for lunch and M and A and I walked to Albert Heijn and bought a bunch of random stuff - bagels, cheese, orange juice, chocolate-covered peanuts - and had a picnic beside a canal, by the shopping center. LOL! It was cold, but gezellig. Antoanete was completely silly and jumpy and acting like a little kid - I couldn't stop laughing at her all day. When some people behave like that, it's annoying, but when she does it, you can't react in any way except laughter.
Then we went back to 'work' - split up into our different rooms and the listening began. Three parts, A, B, and (what else) C. There were actually two separate texts in A, and they were both very easy - I'm sure I got every answer right. But that was just lulling us into a false sense of security, because B totally kicked my @$$. But that was partly because I had a (very) full stomach and so I had that 'sleepy' feeling, and we had already done a long test that morning... I was having trouble concentrating. C was better, but I don't know if that's because I woke up again (they managed to break the CD player and have to go trawling for another one, giving us a breather) or because the text really was easier. We shall see.
Anyway, so then we were done and M and A and I - after a long discussion about whether or not strippenkaarten and abonnementen can be used in the trains - took the train back to Utrecht and went shopping in the station shopping centre (Hoog Catherijne). And I tried on so many shoes, but what IS it with the shoes here - either they're boots which are too tight for my legs, or they're completely flat shoes with absolutely no support on the bottoms. And I have 'picky feet'. So, to keep a long story short, I'm still looking...
So Antoanete left and Mirela and I walked around the V&D for a while, but then we ran into Laura - another girl from our Boswell class, but from C1. Apparently she'd taken the test today too, but I hadn't seen her. She and I had been good friends in C1, but we'd somehow lost each other's numbers. So then Mirela left and Laura and I went up to the top floor and got something to drink and chatted for a while - or, rather, she vented about work and I smiled and nodded and drank my strawberry whatever-it-was... really, she must have gone on for like twenty minutes straight, no exaggeration, and I was practically falling asleep...
So I finally managed to extract myself from her and I got on the bus and came home... and here I am, typing this entry in Word at 18.34 and waiting for the computer to 'realize' it has a connection so I can put it in Blogger for real.
Tomorrow: second day of Staatsexamen (speaking and writing)
Sunday: SLEEPING... oh yeah, and going to Linde's
Monday: 15u class, also have two translations and a mini-essay to do
Tuesday: 13u class, finish those assignments which I won't finish Monday
Wednesday: 9u class, then to Doetinchem (English lesson for Wim)
Thursday: 13u class (turn in mini-essay)
Friday: 11u class
...And that's as far as I know so far... hoping to squeeze a few more friends in there (Martin, Tristan, Lotte, and maybe the long shot David) but we shall see...
It's almost ER time... let's see if I can finagle getting the television...
P.S. I am allowed to do Renate Dorrestein for the translation, and the Dutch version of A Heart of Stone (Een hart van steen) got here yesterday. So now Mom and Dad's package just needs to get here... with the book and that cheese, mmm... you sent it one week ago today, so it shouldn't be long now... my guess is Wednesday... hope so!
P.P.S. Favorite song of the moment - "Eye of the Tiger" from the 'Rocky' soundtrack. Catie and David, my fellow understanders of the greatness of what makes a Driving Song... DL it!!!
stormed at 12:47
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