Birthday/The Netherlands

Well, I'm quite a bit behind in my posting, but since the time of my trip to Usedom, a lot has happened! First, the day after I got back was my 18th Birthday! That means I can legally stay in the Clubs as late as I want (the 16 and 17 year olds must leave at midnight), of course, Rotary says I can't drink and my friends have to leave by midnight anyway, so it makes no difference to me. Since my birthday was in the middle of the holidays, I only had two people over to visit. Afterwards, we went to a huge "Abi Party", a party for the students who finish school this year, and anyone over 16 could go.

The next morning, we went to Egmond, in the Netherlands, to stay at Ingeborg's uncle's cottage. Her mother was also there. We saw the beach in the area and the dunes, (again, quite similar to PEI) and toured around the small town. The next morning, we went to Amsterdam (a very nice place, by the way), and toured the city, and we also went on a boat tour during the afternoon. The city was littered with police in riot gear, apparently there was a soccer game against the Czech Republic that night, and they were preparing to disperse any revellers. Amsterdam is amazing, but at times in a moderately scary way. Everywhere you look, there's an advertisement for porn and every second shop sells drug paraphernalia. It's impossible to avoid seeing either one, since it's everywhere. Jobst almost inadvertently led us (with two young girls and one old woman in tow) into the Red Light district (I figured he knew something I didn't. I was wrong) and quickly turned us around. Despite this rough edge, the city still has a lot of charm, and I definitely want to go back someday. That evening, we went to another beach, about one kilometre from the first one. We flew kites, and had some fun, and went for a walk, and then we had supper at a nice restaurant.

The next day, we went to another city, Alkmaar. It was also very nice, and we window shopped all day. I ended up buying a pair of jeans. We then returned to Egmond and had supper at another great restaurant.

The following morning, we returned home, and I was released to enjoy my first bit of time off in a few weeks.

Between then, and October 30th, very little happened, besides going to school, and getting lost about 10 km from my house in the middle of the night, past when I said I'd be home. That's what I get for a) not knowing the bus schedule, b) improper planning, and c) not travelling with a friend.

On October 30th, I went to a soccer match between Alemannia Aachen (it literally means "the Germans of Aachen," when translated from Latin) and VfL Bochum. The stadium was packed, and the atmosphere was ridiculous. Even if you were at either a packed house in Cahill Stadium (such as the Royal Bank Cup final in '97) or one of those final playoff games at the Wellness Centre, you'd still have no idea what the atmosphere was like. The only similarity is that the visiting team's supporters were relegated to one tiny corner of the stadium. Every single person in attendance (except my host father and I) had an Alemania Aachen scarf, and many also had huge flags on huge staffs, (3x4m, or bigger) supporting the team. Before the game, they play the Alemania anthem, which the whole crowd sings, followed by the Tivoli (the stadium) Hymn, again, sung by the whole crowd, this is without prompting too. The announcer read the first name of each player, with the whole crowed shouting back the last name for him, also out of memory, and at the end, he would shout "Danke Danke!" (thank you, thank you), and the crowd replied, "Bitte Bitte!" (you're welcome, you're welcome).

The whole crowd moves with the players, cheering, jeering, sighing, etc, and intensely following the match. The first goal was scored by Alemannia, however, it was into their own net, a bad head-butt off of a corner kick. However, they came back, and ended up winning 3-2, and after every goal, the crowd went nuts, twirling their scarves, and screaming, and chanting! It's a totally different experience than anything in North America.

Another interesting thing is that after the game, the police block off an entire street, and a column of buses are parked inside of it. The visiting fans exit via a special exit, the entire visiting section was blocked by fences, and they poured into the buses, which then departed, with a full police escort, to the train station, where a platform was blocked off by the police, and they were escorted onto a special train, which won't stop until it gets to Bochum. Supposedly, if the security was any less, there'd be riots.

This brings me to today, Halloween, and a four day weekend!