Day 13

Day 13 is our first official day in Holland.


The group is divided into two: the education and health sector. Since I've studied a year at a Medical School, I think the health sector is more relevant to me.

I'm actually lucky I enlisted myself in Health because the first that we visit is Cruquiushoeue, a health care institution with a unique way of helping disabled clients to recuperate by horseback riding. We also get to try to ride horses. Yippee! I feel sorry for the other group, though. But I'm sure they have a good time visiting schools around Hoofdorp.

Me riding a tall black beautiful horse.

Sean nervously trying to get on the horse

After our fun experience horseback riding, we visit the hospital Spaarne Ziekenhuis, which translates to 'Heal the Persons'. It takes15 years of planning for the hospital to be established and it costs just 50 million euros!

The interior of the hospital is so nice, it looks waaaaay better than the Mactan International airport.

Leoniek, my host sister in Holland works as nurse in the orthopedic ward. While they are giving us a tour, we find out how advance the hospital is. Instead of clipboards for nurses to keep track of the patient's records, they each have their own laptop with database access to all the patient's information. We are also toured into the kitchen. Instead of serving the same kind of regulated diet to their clients, they provide them a choice.

After the hospital visit, we stop by for awhile at Tabitha. After that, we drive to Amsterdam. We get a little bit separated from each other. We are also hungry because some of us including me forget to bring lunch. A beautiful dark woman comes to fetch us from the parking a lot and gives us a copy of the program.


We have an excursion walk around the southeast part of Amsterdam. The beautiful dark lady who looks like Rihanna introduces herself as Veronica. She leads our tour or excursion walk.

Let the walkathon begin. With poise and grace, Veronica walks so fast, Sean and I had to jog to keep up with her pace. Faith surrenders and heads back to the head quarters because her knees gave up on her. (We later realize her shoes are not conducive for walking.)

We go inside a sports center.

A building's interesting shape captures my eye

At the Arena. I actually thought Arena is a football stadium, but it is a train stadium.

Me standing in front of Ajax Arena/ Stadium. Ajax is the football team representing Amsterdam and it is one of the top teams in Holland.

The excursion walk is long and is starting to get tiring. I am relieve there is a feast awaiting our return. Roots for Development serve us delicious snacks and refreshments. The rest of the delegates from the educational group arrive and we share each other's experiences during the day.

The CEO of Roots welcomes us. He is quite busy preparing for his wedding.

During the activity before dinner, we have speed dating, it's more on getting to know each other's culture.

With my partner, we talk mostly about Architecture and about dealing with diversity as a group. I mention to him how fascinated I am of Dutch Architecture as an enthusiastic Architecture student. He's told me a lot about Amsterdam and Rotterdam. (credits to Faith for the photo)

We have dinner and since there are members of Roots for Development  who are Filipinos, we taste Filipino food for the first time in a long time. I think I have eaten a lot.

Lekker! (credits to Faith for the photo)

After we are stuffed, Veronica presents Roots for Development. We also get the chance to present our AVP presentation on the tourism video of the Philippines and of our mission as delegates of the Young Minds on Xplore. While I present the video of the sad situation of Cebu City, Veronica is surprise to discover how unconducive for learning our public schools are.

Julla explains the content of the video