Wednesday 31 August 2005

Temporary number

I have a temporary number at the moment: +31-6-16092948
This as I have a phonebill of almost 500€ for the month July. I had to use my phone for the OSCE mission in Albania, as the phone they provided, didn't work and we had to report back to headquarters.

Thursday 18 August 2005

Central Park panorama Posted by Picasa

Wall Street Posted by Picasa

Ground Zero Posted by Picasa

The MET Posted by Picasa

Contrast Posted by Picasa

The Guggenheim Posted by Picasa

Reading in Cetral Park Posted by Picasa

Me in Central Park Posted by Picasa

UN Building Posted by Picasa

View to downtown NY from the water Posted by Picasa

The coaches Posted by Picasa

Two hotties Posted by Picasa

The Male Coaches (here Borja) were very popular... Posted by Picasa

Sauk Valley Resort Posted by Picasa

Some pilots and Me Posted by Picasa

Old and New Posted by Picasa

Skyscraper Posted by Picasa

Jews and Cab Posted by Picasa

Top of Empire State Building Posted by Picasa

Arriving in NYC Posted by Picasa

Tuesday 16 August 2005

Last days in the US

Well, I'm back in Holland (or The Netherlands, how you want to call it) and had a great time in NY. On Thursday I visited Wall Street and Ground Zero, on Friday I did a bike tour through the Bronx. Saturday I spend in the Bronx as well before leaving to the airport. Sadly I wasn't able to get a later flight, although the flight was overbooked again, but they didn't need my seat. Would have been nice to stay a day longer and get some extra money. Sometimes they pay up tp 600€ for taking a later flight. :)

Visiting Wall Street was fun, although there is not really much to see. I sat on some stairs looking at the trade building and a man starting talking to me. He turned out to be a controller (or something like that) for some firm at Wall Street and I was wearing an orange shirt with DUTCHY on the back, so he reacted on that. His cousin went to school with Maxima, he said, and we talked a bit about women, money, NY, banking, his kids and more. Was fun and had a nice chat. Also went to Ground Zero. Just a big hole in the ground with a big fence around it. Not much else, was a bit disappointing. Had expected more. On Friday I participated in a biking tour through the Bronx. Was fun, though it went a bit slow; it was a good way to explore a different area than the ones you normally visit. 2 Guides, 2 families of 4 and me, were on the trip. I was in the back, talking to one of the guides, when I braked, with my front brake (a bit too hard) and I tipped over the front of my bike landing on my chin... The one who owns 3 bikes, comes from the country with the most cycling paths and where they have more bikes than inhabitants, falls. I never looked so stupid. Good that the rest drove ahead. :)

Thursday 11 August 2005

The MET

Yesterday I visited the Metropolitan Museum of Arts. I planned to go to MoMA, but for some reason I ended up in a queue at the MET with a free ticket for MoMA in my hands. That didn't really work. :) I mixed up the locations of both museums, but the MEt was fine (if not better) as well.

Let me say that I entered the MET at 10 and came out at 16hrs and still hadn't seen all the rooms and exhibitions. It is HUGE... Ok, I skipped the musical instruments and porcelain-section (as they simply don't interest me), but further tried to see everything. From Chinese, Cypriotic and Korean to European and American art. Cabinets, paintings, sketches, sculptures, modern stuff, jewelry and history artifacts. I've seen most of them. My feet hurt after that.

The evening I spend at the lower east side, eating in a very nice Korean restaurant (all with sticks) and enjoying the scenery in a more quiet part of town while walking around.

Jon (from the field hockey camp) gave me a call this morning. He was in the queue for the Empire State Building and since he's leaving town today again, we might have lunch in a while.

What I still have to see: MoMA, Ground Zero and Wallstreet. So I have a busy schedule.

Tuesday 9 August 2005

More NYC

So what have I done so far? Visited the Empire State Building, the Rockefeller Center, the USS Intrepid, the Museum for Natural History, Central Park, Brooklyn and the Guggenheim Museum (today). Also took a 2-hour boat tour around Manhattan and walked a lot around the city (haven't taken a single cab yet). On the programme are a bicycle-tour, MOMA and the MET.
The hostel is fine, sleep with 8 or 9 others (mixed) on a room, but they don't snore or make a lot of noise, so we get along quite good. Will stay there for the rest of the time.

Monday 8 August 2005

Today

Well, after getting my phone to work I went to the UN building, did a tour there, walked to Central Park, to the sub to the upper north of the park, only to figure out that it dropped me off at 125th Str. Which is 15 blocks too far! So I walked back through Central Park, looked at the baseball games, watched a dancing skating exhibition, sat in the park reading Madeleine Albright's book and went back to the centre. Now sitting here and not a clue what I will do tonight. Tomorrow probably visit the MOMA.

Sunday 7 August 2005

Phone 2

Finally figured out what happened to my phone last night: i have to pay for INCOMING calls as well and I ran out of credit. Really, America is weird at certain times... But have money on my phone again, so everyone can call again. :)

Phone does weird

My american phone is acting weird. Someone tried to call me last night, but it turned all the calls down and I received an sms that I didn't have enough credit on my phone. So I spend 45min to look for a place where I could get a prepaid card for my Verizon phone and it turned out that in the whole of NYC you can only get that at the verizon stores, which were of course all closed. Now I asked someone to call me and it works again, so I don't have a clue what's going on. If you try to call me and don't get through, try again, write me an sms or an email. Sorry for any inconvenience...

Translation

Sorry for the last post, but I used an automatic translator for that and that doesn't work so well. Looks like next time I do have to write it all again myself! :)

Going now, spend enough money here.

Saturday 6 August 2005

Field Hockey Camp

After many detours finally back in NY; God it was a horrible trip. Camp is over, the girls got many experiences and photographs (as got I) and normal life goes on. It was a tremendous week with a lot, really a lot of hockey, conditioning, little sleep, excellent food, amusing evening activities and many new friends.

The camp was situated in a beautiful surrounding with a lake and on a beautiful hill. The only thing what I didn't like from the whole week, was that we played on GRASS, instead of on turf or astroturf like we play on backhome and in the rest of Europe... The quality/level of playing is because of that also automatic a bit less than in Europe, as some moves and plays are impossible to do on grass. I have to admit that I do not play great on grass as well, as the last time I played on it was many years ago. There were girls that were certainly just as good and sometimes even better than I... It was nice to play on grass once again, but I don't want to think of having to play a competition on grass again.

The staff consisted mainly of Americans (players of the team of the organizer), 3 Spaniards, 3 English, 1 Australian and myself. It was a busy and very tiring week, but certainly worth coming and for repetition susceptible.

The program started with breakfast from around 7am, conditioning, practicing, 3V3 competitions, lunch, conditioning, master skills sessions (kind of training), 7V7 competitions, evening meal and world cup competitions (11v11). All coaches were responsible for 1 training group and 1 world cup group, thus meaning that you got to know and had to deal with 2 different groups of girls. Both consisting of approximately 12 girls per group. In total were there approximately 150 girls in the age of 11 until 17. I had one of the slightly older groups and trained Navy and coached Holland (what a coincidence). Both very amusing groups and we had many laughs. The men under us (3 Spaniards, 1 Englishman and myself) got all the attention, as we the only men in the camp. Several love-declarations, embraces and what not yet more we had to undergo this week. Borja and James were even so popular that they got a T-Shirt with "I love Borja and James" and "Do you want to marry me?" I only got a very romantic song, sang to me during one of the practices. :)

 

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