Jam on Xplore

Queen's Day
I woke up early and before my roomie J.Lo. I prepare my orange clothes and orange make up.

We meet at the center of Hoofdorp. There aren't many people yet and we see that some of the people were not even wearing orange. With my orange hat, orange cardigan, shirt and skirt and my orange ribbon tied on my hair, I feel so overdressed.

A funny sexy dress I only wear for the photo

I am so relieve that my co-delegates are also wearing orange. We look like three pairs of twins. J.Lo and I with our matching skirts, Martin and Sean with their matching shirts and sunglasses and Dan and Jedde with matching leis.

The flea market where people sell the old stuff they don't need to people who need them.

I buy an old Polaroid camera. I can't find the film for it, though.

After roaming around Hoofdorp, I only buy the camera and shoes for my cousin at C&A. After lunch with rice which we shared with each other, we go to the station to ride a bus to Haarlem.

Jump shots while waiting for the bus

We are only given little time to spend around Haarlem and since it's crowded, Louise and Robin, our Dutch youth counterparts wrote their numbers on our wrists.

Luc wearing a silly pair of sunglasses.

We walk around Haarlem, but it's really difficult to go through the crowd. Everyone is in party mood and it reminds me of Sinulog, only everyone is wearing orange. Aside from stalls of second hand stuffs, there are beer stations everywhere and band/singers performing.

We drop by a Protestant church turned beer brewery for drinks. The Dutch laugh when we order milk. Haha.

Bottom's up! I'm not sure if Julla is a beer drinker or she just want to try how beer tastes like in Netherlands.

The large crowd of people gathers to PARTY!

I have not accomplished much of things in Haarlem because of the crowd. I didn't find any good buys. Danica, however, found a good buy. A second hand iPod nano for only 15 euros! It's not sold with the charger/usb and headset, but it's still a very good buy. And yep, it works!

Sean falls asleep on the bus going home.

After Queen's day, the Kols, my host family and the de Blocks gather at the Van Der Tol's residence for a barbecue party. We have grilled bacon, chicken, sausages and meat balls/bola-bola. (Urgh, writing about the food makes me hungry.) We set the dinner outside, but it turns out becoming very cold despite the sunniness in the morning.

Lekker! Lekker!

The wind blows and it's really chilly!

After dinner, the youngsters gather in the living room and we play the famous Pinoy Henyo of Eat Bulaga. The mechanics of the game is to guess the word that is written above you on your forehead by asking yes or no questions.

Sanne is not able to guess the word bacon, too. She knows that the word's a food and when she asks if it's yummy, we say yes. As a vegetarian, bacon is probably not on the list of yummy foods.

Dan's word is Char. He uses the Cebuano expression often, but he isn't able to get it.

We probably return home at 10pm. J.Lo and I still have to pack our things. The day after this Orange festival, we are changing hosts and also partners. Aside from missing the Kols, I will also miss my soul sister J.Lo, whom I've regarded as my own sister. I will miss our time together talking girl stuffs until 1 in the morning or until one of us dozes off.

We spend the 16th day of our trip sightseeing around Holland. We are divided into small groups. J.Lo and I ride in Ria de Block's car.

Our first stop is the castle.

Standing is about 1/4 of the original structure.

The view from the tallest tower of the castle.

We go driving around Holland. We pass by Haarlem and also a posh community in Holland where large single-detached houses are built. We stop by across a large steel factory. It smells weird and puffs of smoke come out from them and I pretend I'm in District 12's cold mine.

J.Lo and I are asleep in the car. Unfortunately also, my camera's battery is almost empty, so I don't have much pictures.

We share a meal with each other because some of us brought rice for lunch.

We stop by at a large field of tulips. I wish I could take some tulips back to the Philippines, but they don't allow that.

Soul sisters J.Lo and I

After our sight seeing, we hear mass in the school. It's a Protestant service. I'm Catholic and it's my first time attending a Protestant service. I'm fascinated at how they conduct their services with a lot of singing and clapping of the hands. They don't have priests to celebrate the ceremony but they have a speaker to discuss pressing issues related to the scripture.



After the service, we have Dutch night. We draw clogs, tulips or windmills on wooden boards and cut them with saw. It's much work. I'm not use to cutting wood with saw, however, our Dutch counterparts seem to be really skillful. Then we painted our work.

I love painting, but because I've been using watercolor as a medium lately, I forgot how it is to use acrylic or poster paint.

Our crafted and painted works. We pinoys are creative.

Jedde, Sean and Sir Tats showing their painted windmills.

For dinner, we have Dutch pancakes. They're usually think but thicker then creppe and you sprinkle powedered sugar or top it with syrup. After dinner, we have Dutch games.  I learn to play billiards. Others try on Dutch costumes for a photo.

Martin and Saira in Dutch costumes. Saira is holding her masterpiece.

Julla with other Dutch youth counterparts playing the 'Leaning tower of Piza'

Russel learning how to play billiards with Martin's assistance

Sjors and Jedde playing a typical Dutch card game.

After losing the billiard games, Arge, Martin and Sir Tats adorn my face with icing. In the photo, I smile beside the pretty Anita, who I once hosted back in 2011 when she came to the Philippines.

Family day with Host Family at Rotterdam.

I'm very glad and thankful that my host family heeds my request and brings us to Rotterdam, the second biggest city of Holland and perhaps, the most modern city. I think it is the seat of Architecture of Holland because of it's well planned city and road, its modern buildings and the famous Erasmusbrug, designed by Dutch architect Ben van Berkel.

The Netherlands Architecture Institute (NAI) museum is also located in Rotterdam. I find out about this even before my trip to Netherlands while researching about Netherlands architecture.

The weather is not fine, but it stops raining when we arrive.  We park the car near the metro station and we ride a metro to NAI. The amazing thing about Rotterdam is that every part of the city is accessible because of its well-planned metro.

Rotterdam's Metro

The Kol sisters: Leoniek and Sanne. Pretty, aren't they?

A nice minimalistic house across NAI

Seeing NAI from afar fills me with joy and excitement. It's like the fulfillment of my trip. NAI is probably each architect's haven.

The NAI museum completes my trip in Holland as an Architecture student. The museum exhibits the importance of urban planning to cater to the needs of the citizens. Not only politicians, investors or city designers are involve in city planning, but also citizens play important role in changing the living environment.

Before starting our museum trip, we chill out for hot chocolate and tea at the NAI Cafe.

Making City Exhibit shows the spatial planning for Rotterdam.

Dutchville- Ideas for the city of the future.

The NAI library: If I probably live in Rotterdam, I'll come by here everyday.

Our trip to the Netherlands Architecture Institute has help J.Lo and I greatly on our project MegaCebu, since the main exhibit of the month is about city development and planning.

Leoniek and J.Lo discussing which route to take to the Erasmus bridge

We take a walk around the city and find the famous Erasmus bridge.

The Erasmus bridge is Rotterdam's trademark. It's a beautiful cable-stayed bridge about 89-meters long. We walked across it.

We visit Rotterdam's center. It's full of people. J.Lo and I shop for souvenirs. After having shopped, we walk to the famous cube houses. It is located on Overblaak street. It consists of 38 small cubes and two super cubes attached to each other. The cubes are occupied by residents, but it is also a famous tourist destination.

The Cube Houses is designed by Dutch Architect Piet Blom.

While I don't quite love it, I still think it's a great architecture for its unique shape and personality.

The first place we visit is Meerlanden. It is a landfill, but it totally doesn't look like the landfill we have in Inayawan, Cebu. It's more like a factory. There advance equipments that help manage garbage and produce green gas or biogas from them.

This project was once implemented in the Philippines, but it failed.

Just to be safe, we wear neon orange vests

We go to AM Groep. They are an institution that provides opportunities to those unemployed because of physical or psychological adversities. I wonder why there are companies who hire the disabled until I learn that private companies gain benefits if they hire disabled employees. We go to the food bank where they distribute goods to the poor and at the same time encourage them to find work.

The food bank distributes the goods equally in these yellow baskets.

We visit the second hand shop. A lot of people buy books and toys that they get for a very cheap price. Worried about my luggage, I don't buy anything.

These bicycles are trash to their previous owners, but they could be treasures to others. I'm tempted to buy a bike because they are still functional, but I'm already concern about the luggage.

Then, we prepare ourselves for the courtesy call with the city officials of Haarlemermeyer. We all change to our flag shirts.

In the city hall, the officials welcome us. They lead us into their conference hall where we sit alternating each other. After they present to us a backgrounder of the city of Haarlemermeyer, they open themselves for our questions. I ask questions about urban planning in the context of MegaCebu and on how they develop a strategic urban plan. They promise to sit down with us at one point to discuss urban planning.

The city officials of Haarlemermeyer welcome us warmly.

The Mayor and the delegates discussing about Queen's day. Impulsively, Russel points out to the mayor his orange tie in a melodic tone, "Orange."

Faith follows up my question on City Development and Urban Planning.

We have dinner with the Filipino community in Netherlands. (Yes, Pinoy food again, which means Rice will be served.) After stuffing ourselves with nostalgic Pinoy food, a Holland trivia game is conducted that for every question you get correctly, you get prices.

Some of the things I remember about Holland after the game.

- A part of Amsterdam is built on poles.
- Some part of Holland is 5 meters below sea level.
- Rotterdam has once the biggest port in the world. Now, it ranks third.
- Keukenhof is the largest tulip garden in the world.

J.Lo claiming her price from Arlene, the game master.

A Filipino-Dutch points out that Sean looks like the famous Jed Madela. We all make fun of him for it.

I ask the Filipino-Dutch if they still point with their lips, a distinct mannerism of Filipinos. Everyone burst out laughing at my question. The Filipino-Dutch confirms that they still do so. They may be born and raised in Holland, but they are still innately Pinoy.