A Party Boat, Opera, and the Plastic Soup

A Party Boat, Opera, and the Plastic Soup

Last fall Axa participated in an academic competition with kids from schools around Amsterdam to design an invention. Another team ended up winning according to the judges, but the audience prize went to Axa and her classmates from Denise.

Their winning idea was a “Party Boat”. The boat would be made of recycled plastic. On the boat would be a dance floor that collected kinetic energy from the dancers and converted it to power the boat. It would also somehow collect the energy generated when they sang into the microphone. Besides being fun, the boat was meant to raise awareness of the “plastic soup” clogging the world’s oceans and threatening the lives of marine creatures and the health of the planet.… Read more

Amsterdam House Tour: The Dungeon

Amsterdam House Tour: The Dungeon

Many of the houses we looked at in Amsterdam had some kind of storage room available. Sometimes it was a detached room on a completely different floor in the building. Once it was an attic room, weirdly accessible through an illegally built ladder right next to the fireplace in the living room.

The house we ended up picking was much more normal (not). A nine square metre (100 square feet) storage room lay just under the living room, accessible (as you’ll remember) literally through a hole in the middle of the floor.

Thanks to my brilliantly designed wall and a matching bannister, it no longer looks like somewhere you’d hide a body and then put a rug on top of the trap door.… Read more

Amsterdam House Tour: Kid Room

Amsterdam House Tour: Kid Room

One of our major hurdles in buying a house in Amsterdam was finding a second bedroom with enough space to accommodate both children (a three bedroom was out given our price range, unless we wanted to live well outside the city). And by that I don’t mean loads of floor space for playing. I just mean fitting in two beds. A lot of the second bedrooms in Amsterdam apartments have enough space for a single bed and maybe a small wardrobe or chest of drawers. We thought about bunk beds, but really felt strongly that since our kids are older and it’s already pushing for them to share a room, they each needed a well-defined space of their own. … Read more

My Podcast Career So Far

My Podcast Career So Far

I was not a podcast early adopter. A couple of years ago when Serial first broke, it took several of my friends raving about it for weeks if not months before I finally got around to listening. And for years, it remained the only podcast I had ever listened to. It’s not that I was opposed to listening; it’s just that I was accustomed to reading instead, having left National Public Radio and audiobooks behind with my hour-long car commute when I moved to Amsterdam.

So the first time I appeared on a podcast, I didn’t really have a huge frame of reference.… Read more

Amsterdam House Tour – Master Bedroom

Amsterdam House Tour – Master Bedroom

Actually, I think this is my favorite room in the house. Is there anything more important when it comes to home decor than an inviting bedroom that is a refuge from the entire world outside? For an introvert with insomniac tendencies, I submit that there is not. So here is mine. Red velvet curtains, crisp linen bedclothes, fuzzy throw blanket, and all. I have been in love with this bedroom since the first night I slept in it, or in fact since I first saw it in my mind’s eye before it even existed.
All the little details are what I love.… Read more

Amsterdam House Tour – The Library (Living Room)

Amsterdam House Tour – The Library (Living Room)

This may be my favourite room in a house full of rooms I love. Having moved over twenty times since we were married in 2003 (I wish I were exaggerating), Tony and I have come to realise that although we have many things in common, our decorating tastes, although overlapping, are not identical. So when we moved into our new house, we decided that we would each get a room to decorate exactly how we pleased. The other party could serve in an advisory capacity, but the person to whom the room belonged had total autonomy when it came to layout and decor.… Read more

Amsterdam House Tour – The Hallway (Landing Strip)

Amsterdam House Tour – The Hallway (Landing Strip)

We have now lived in our darling Amsterdam flat for a whole year, so I guess it’s high time to invite you in for a tour.

In order to fully appreciate our house, it’s good to know some stats about it. For instance, it’s a grand total of 72 square metres (775 square feet). I think of it as both a small flat and a really big tiny house. When it comes to functionality, I’d say it definitely feels more like the latter. Over the years, we have spent a lot of time in IKEA showrooms and cleverly designed little European apartments, marvelling over inventive storage solutions and multi-purpose furniture.… Read more

Choosing a High School in Amsterdam: The Lottery!

Choosing a High School in Amsterdam: The Lottery!

Surprisingly enough, I have not been obsessing about the lottery every spare moment since we turned in Axa’s form almost a month ago. There were even some times when I forgot about it completely. However, as the time drew near for the blessed event, I did start to think about it more–several times a day by the final week. I had at least one nightmare where she got placed in a school that wasn’t even on her list. I was at pains not to mention the lottery to Axa (well, at least to not bring it up more than once every couple of days), since I didn’t want her to stress about it.… Read more

Personality, Language, and Why I Don’t Speak Dutch Yet

Personality, Language, and Why I Don’t Speak Dutch Yet

Before I start I just have to say that this is kind of a vulnerable post. It’s a topic that is fracturing my entire self-concept and leaves me feeling very open to criticism. I don’t know why I’m writing it at all, except that I spend so much time thinking about it. So anyway.

A few weeks ago, an article titled Are We Different People in Different Languages? was circulating Facebook amongst various of my international friends. It’s a brilliant article on creative writing and multilingualism, and I recommend it if you’re interested in either of those subjects. But the discussion online was centred mostly on the title of the article.… Read more

Schinkelbuurt in Bygone Days

Schinkelbuurt in Bygone Days

Ever since we bought our new house I’ve been meaning to go down to the city archives and look up our address to see if any old photographs existed of our house. A couple of days ago, somebody told me that the city archives have a website where you can do just that from the comfort of your own home. And I immediately began planning this blog post, in which I go around our neighborhood and take then-and-now photos to match the ones in the archive. So welcome to a trip down memory lane and a glimpse of the Schinkelbuurt of yesterday.… Read more