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March 30, 2004
Copenhagen
Just to make a point of the bleeding obvious, its different when you travel with a baby. And thus, you see and notice different things about places. Like for instance, the size of the prams. I have never seen such big prams as those used by nearly everone in Copenhagen! These were the Jeep Chrysler/Mack Truck versions of the pram world. In Amsterdam they wouldn't even fit on the footpath, and would probably be considered big enough to house a small family here in the Pijp! Any of them were certainly bigger than our bathroom. (And there are people out there who think I'm joking about that!) We stayed at the Hotel Valberg which proved very relaxing, despite the ten flights of stairs and a very scary lift! Copenhagen itself was lovely and in the grip os some sort of spring-fever, the temperature during the day soaring to 2 or 3 degrees above zero! Jacob seems to have accepted that much of his life is going to be spent sitting outside pubs (!) and proved very resilient when trying out various unidentifiable Danish babyfoods. I don't think he's been eating reindeer. We saw lots of kitsch candles with Mary and the Prince on them in the leadup to the wedding, lots of nice yellow houses to cheer everyone up through the long winter months, lots of pointy pixie-ish faces and a tendency to wear hats which emphasized this and lots of fairytale buildings. I mean the Stock exchange has dragons-claws on its roof?! The photos are here.
Posted by Faith at 10:31 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
March 24, 2004
ode to french hotels
I love French hotels.
More specifically, I love old, slightly (OK, sometimes very) shabby French hotels that still have a hint of "hotel-life" about them. What you might lose in facilities, and usually in the bathroom, you will more than gain in character (and often that will be in the bathrom too!).
French hotels we've loved are;
No.1 The Rhone Hotel, Sechelles.
The place reeked of a 70's renovation, but even then, one that paid more attention to the 1870's than the 1970's. The cistern in the toliet was a gleaming work of art from the 1920's, the bath was an enormous and fantastic celebration of early twentieth century engineering, the bedrooom a celebration of flock and french decoration, the loungeroom a brown horror and the terrace overlooking the Rhine the perfect spot to spend hours killing a few glasses of the local wine and filling in one postcard. The owner was French, cynical and married to an Australian, (well there you go), his staff French and surly except for the woman who did breakfast who was unremittingly talkative......in French, and one lost boy from the American mid-west doing his obligatory year-in-Europe. As a joke they let him cook for the tourists and this was the only French hotel I've ever stayed in where the food was average. The key to our room had a kangaroo keychain, the bed was propped up by a pile of paperbacks and the window sill was the perfect place to keep our very smelly Haute Savoie cheese that sustained us on our walks each day. That is until it packed its own bags and left.
No.2 Hotel Lion D'Or, Langres
This hotel was not quite so fascinating and our room had one of those horrible cabin-showers. But it was situated very pcturesquely by the River D'Or with charming (if they're in France and full of geraniums they're always charming, non?) window boxes and little fluttering flags. Further the breakfast room was the perfect example of a musty damp overheated glassed in terrace complete with slightly green light from the algae growing on the terrass glass. This led one to suspect that the trout swimming in the enormous aquarium had it slightly better than the guests. Until dinner time that is. Which as it turned out was what it was all about. Many of the guests were there for the trout fishing and the owner had bought the hotel specifically so he could cook trout for people. Which brings me to what was so good about the place. The most drop-dead gorgeous melt-in-your-mouth trout I've ever tasted in my life! I still can't drive past Dijon without a longing glance to the east, only a few kms in that direction....... And they might even have better rooms, ours was the last available so it was a case of beggars-can't-be-choosers.
No.3 Hotel Doree, Paris
The Hotel Doree on the Rues Barbes in Montmartre will go down in history with us as having the most comfortable beds in the universe. This was lucky as the bath was tiny, the walls cardboard thin and the rooms tiny, stuffy crimson-flock nightmares but we loved it. Even living with the owners art-work which is its raison d'etre (doubling as a gallery for the husband's paintings). They also had sensational croissants, fabulous staff and that gorgeous French butter. And they're in Montmartre, always a winner!
No.4 Hotel St Christophe, Neufchateu
We stopped here on the way back from Les Arcs. We were the only guests in the entire hotel where the heating was cranked up to a tropical 120F for our benefit. The food was microwaved, the shower not quite as clean as you'd like and we were promised that they would "worm" our baby bottles. It was fabulous............ Just the anti-dote to a week in Les Arcs!
Posted by Faith at 08:31 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
March 20, 2004
Jacob Under Construction
Jacob is six months old as of yesterday. This past few weeks he has been especially busy with;
-his hands. He spends hours a day turning his hands this way and that and bringing them together. He'll aslo grab one of our hands and examine it, then examine his free hand for comparision.
-aeroplanes. Lying on his tummy making like an aeroplane in an effort to build up those tummy muscles so he can sit up by himself.
-push-ups. lots and lots of puships to the point that his whole upper torso is now off the ground for long periods. He is now practising one-handed push ups, (this is where those lateral aeroplane imitations come in handy) and is trying now and then to get up on his knees.
A strange thought occured to me yesterday. That actually I love babies and wouldn't mind having at least ten of them! Luckily, at 38, I'm unlikely to wake up one day in the future and find that I've pursued this new ambition.
Posted by Faith at 11:01 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
March 18, 2004
spinning!
Its so exciting! One of the projects I managed last year has been nominated for a Spin Award!. The Spin Awards are the awards for interactive communications in the Netherlands. We have been nominated in the category Best Website Concept for the KPN Breedband Portal, thanks to the brilliant work of my colleagues, Jaap, Peter and Rob. The project is a bit of a distant blur now, 14 hour days while 7 months pregnant and during the komkomertijd and all!
The category is open to public voting so you can all vote for us by clicking on the "Stem voor de publieksprijs Spinawards 2003!" link on the site. I think you might even get to win an Xbox or something although I'm not sure if it applies to participants from outside the Netherlands!
We've also been nominated for Best Banner, a KPN Breedband banner which you should have a look at while you're there. Also brilliant, but I can't take any of the credit for this one being on maternity leave at the time.
The only thing that worries me is the date for the announcements, April 1st! Still, its bound to be a good party!
Posted by Faith at 11:52 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
March 14, 2004
Les Arcs
Jacob had one of the more surprising weeks of his life this week when a two day car trip was followed by a week at 1800m at Les Arcs, where everything was white. Just when he got used to this, all the new strange people and french baby food, it was back in the car and another two days back to the Netherlands with a stop-off in Neufchateau in France.
More on that later.............
Descartes had it all wrong. According to Jacob its "I move therefore I am" or maybe its just the after effects of two days in a Maxi-cosi and a body full of white blood cells from a week at high altitude.
We have to stop feeding him.
When we got back from Les Arcs I found an email from Hasitha waiting complete with a photo of his son Kieran who is now three months old. Kieran is very handsome although I'd be worried if I was Hasitha, he also looks very determined!
And today is Uncle Benny's Birthday!
Happy Birthday Ben
from Jacob, Faith and Ron! Gefeliteerd Jonge!
Posted by Faith at 02:21 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
March 03, 2004
tower of babel
Jacob spends his days in the multicultural mix that is the best of Holland.
While some areas of Amsterdam (and the Netherlands) are visibly struggling with multiculturalism and even schools and day care are discussed as being "black" or "white", Jacob is happy at De Schep deep in the "multicultural samenleven" of de Pijp where he is one of six babies, five of whom have at least one non-dutch parent. His carers are Surinamse, Turkish, Morrocan, Bulgarian and Dutch. His days in Ijsselstein are spent in an Italian/Dutch environment where both are spoken and next week in France he will be spending three afternoons at a creche full of french babies while his Mum and Dad go snowboarding together. Cést la vie!
God only knows what he is going to end up speaking.........
Posted by Faith at 11:46 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
March 01, 2004
new neighbours
-the beauty of the Amsterdam system for moving furniture in and out of houses is that you get plenty of time to examine everyone's belongings!
Posted by Faith at 05:25 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack