Tour de Den Haag

Well friends, October was a CRAZY month! I think every weekend but one, I visited another country! The Netherlands, England, France, and Norway all in one month! Not too shabby, eh? Well, with all the out and about I had a hard time getting to this blog. But don’t worry! I took some good notes to remind myself of the important details! 

I will start out with that first weekend of October. I will call it: Tour de Den Haag. The tour guide was, of course, the one and only Sameer Ahmad; Cycling extarordinaire and former resident of the Hague for about 4 years. 

So the gist of this weekend it is that I had been planning on going somewhere else on that first Saturday of October but one of the girl’s I was supposed to go with didn’t feel well. So it fell through. Which turned out to be perfect because that was the weekend that Sameer came back to visit from his new job in Vienna! I had lots of fun hanging out with him. With all the new friends and places and people around me it was nice to spend some time with someone who knew me well. 

First, on Friday night there was a birthday party that a lot of the interns went to. Even though I hadn’t been in a good mood earlier in the day and wasn’t sure if I would go, I’m glad that I did! People were really fun and I had a great time. I even tried muscles for the first time! 

Muscles just look like little lungs...

They weren't my favourite.

As the night progressed people got a little rambunctious and started saying ignorant things about my religion (can’t remember how that came up). Anyway, while that was pretty annoying (why do people only want to talk about it when they’re drunk?) I could see the humour. For one thing, one of my fellow interns joined the conversation a little late and was like, “YOU’RE MORMON?!??” looking at me so alarmed as if I had just told her that …. I’m struggling to think of an appropriate comparison. As if I had just told her that I was a polygamist? Maybe that’s really what she thought had just happened. 

this pretty much summarises my reaction to the 'YOU'RE MORMON?!?' comment

Anyway, she regained her composure and said, “you’re my favourite Mormon that I’ve ever met” or something like that. I’m not really sure how much of a compliment that was but I could tell she was trying. Sometimes it’s nice to surprise people by my religion so that they 1.) don’t pre-judge me and 2.) when they find out realise that Mormons are pretty normal. 

So yeah. That was a notable thing about that night. I talked with Jaime and Sameer for the most part and it was great. 

Saturday was great! I slept in and then met up with Sameer for a bike ride. Sameer is the king of cycling in the Netherlands and he has a favourite place in the middle of nowhere along the beach that he calls “Sameer Spot.” He was shocked that he hadn’t taken me there yet so we biked for awhile through a park in the Hague and along the dune area and over to the beach.

It was fantastic and very empowering! When I first got here, I wouldn’t have been able to bike that long. But now I’m a cycling mar-chine ;). Really though, I hardly got tired and the weather was beautiful and the beach was fantastic. Here are some pictures: 

Scheveningen Beach

Typical Travel selfie

Horseback riding on the beach!...one day...

The Famous "Sameer Spot"! 

Oh yeah! I'm a cyclist now!

I did my own thing that afternoon but then that night I met up with Sameer and another friend, Miriam, from OPCW. We went and saw The Intern and then got deserts at a restaurant near Parliament. Overall a great weekend. And a great reminder that the Hague is incredible!