don’t forget to…

… stop and smell the flowers.

one of the things in my exchange-to-do-list was to visit the tulip garden in holland. the weather this year was really cranky, so the flowers actually bloomed later than usual. but i was blessed to catch the tulip season at the right time! i guess the photos say it all. keukenhof was extremely gorgeous. here’s one of my many favourite photos taken by my trusty lumix cam. (this photo was uneditted btw. you can imagine how amazingly pretty the flowers are in real life!)

it was tough choosing just NINE shots to squeeze into my layout. but i guess i did it =)

just a very simple layout so that the photos can stand out. i’m glad that flowers and lace complement each other very well!

for all flowers fanatics, i bet you will go crazy in holland. a dozen of tulips for TWO euros. gosh.

best fml-worthy train experience

note to self: never EVER take any train when the entire country is celebrating ANY sort of festival.

Even after experiencing flight delay in prague AND flight cancellation in hamburg, i have never wanted to admit that i am unlucky because i would like to think that i’m pretty positive in nature and i totally understand that sometimes shit happens. BUT HOW CAN SHIT HAPPEN SO MANY TIMES? i am not feeling angry/angsty/upset/jaded. i am just wondering HOW. haha. in fact i am pretty amused. so here’s a recount of what happened just about 4-5 hours ago.

it was probably a bad decision to go to holland on queens’ day. the trains were filled with drunk people and i happened to pick the wrong cabin too. there was this bunch of people who:

- were SMOKING in the cabin
- opened the windows despite the fact that it was below 10degrees
- were blowing their orange trumpets
- rolling cans of beers across the cabins

and yes i had to endure that for TWO HOURS only to find out that…

i reached the WRONG STATION at 1am. wee.

when i asked the conductor if the train goes to groningen, he told me that

- i am pretty far away from groningen
-the next train will be at 7am
- everything in or around the station is closed ( even the toilet is closed which means i can’t even stay overnight @ the train station because i need to take my contacts out/pee/fill up my water bottle after being dehydrated for 9 hours)

i couldn’t help it but to say F*** MY LIFE in his face.was totally surprised that i actually did not shed a single tear despite how screwed up the situation was.*give myself a pat on my shoulder*in fact i couldn’t stop laughing when fang called me. probably too overwhelmed. fang was like ” be safe okay!” and i went “i am so angsty now if anyone dares to provoke me i will just squeeze his balls”

this was when MR CONDUCTOR drove past me and asked if i needed a ride. and he asked me if i have cash with me. what a stupid question. in the end he asked if i have 50 euros for petrol and in desperation i called fang again.we decided that 50 euros is pretty decent to get me to her house. so i hopped into his car praying that everything will be okay.

i must say that Mr Conductor’s car was pretty nice. and because he was kind enough to send me to fang’s place, i couldn”t just remain silent throughout the whole ride and we ended up talking about a lot of nonsense. he was quite hilarious so at least the ride was quite enjoyable. for example, when i showed him fang’s address, he said ” are you sure this is not the address of a police station?” and when i told him that i only have 6 months for exchange, he went ” how do you have enough time to enjoy the italian men?” HAHA.

although my heart is still bleeding from the unnecessary 50 euros spent, i guess it was a blessing in disguise. i could have been stranded @ the train station. and to actually hop onto a stranger’s car was SO dangerous. oh well… at least this makes yet another exciting story to tell my grandkids in the future.

PS: i really really pray that all my other trips will be smooth-sailing. i don’t need any more exciting stories.

PPS: Thanks Mr Conductor for ensuring that i reach fang’s place safely!