Where Does This Door Go

So much for consistently updating my blog... I now have more catching up to do... Okay.

On the 13th of June my mom, sister and I arrived in the Netherlands. We had a good flight and after the flight we had a 3 hour drive to Zeeland which is the province in which I will be studying. Here we are staying in a holiday house that is about 30 min away from my university and with that from my dorm room so it has given me the opportunity to go exploring in my uni's city! 

During our stay in Holland we went to a whole bunch of cities (quite often to go to ikea...)

- So stayed in Zeeland for a bit 

- went to an ikea in I think Breda

- went to Amsterdam to visit my granddad and we went to dinner with him

- my cousin came to Zeeland to stay with us for two days which was a lot of fun and I was able to show her where I will be living and studying

- we went to Limburg for an anniversary party of my parents friends from Beijing and stayed in Sittard for 3 nights in a great bed & breakfast, during this trip we also went to Maastricht and the "drielandenpunt" which is where the borders of Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands meet.

- During these times we also went to the ikea in Barendrecht, Delft and I think 2 other places or to the same ones (in total we went 5 times... about 4 too many haha! But it was for my dorm room so it was actually quite fun)

On July 6th I also found out that I passed all my exams!! YAY! I found out at the airport because we were there to pick up my dad and at 14:00 our time the results came online! I am really happy with how I did and was so happy, relieved, excited and overwhelmed all at the same time! 

We also went to Apeldoorn which is where I lived before we moved to Beijing to fix up our house a bit and I was able to meet up with some friends and meet up with family. 

After this trip to Apeldoorn we drove to Calais in France which is where one end of the Eurotunnel to Folkestone in England is located. At first the idea of going under the sea level scared me a bit but it was fine and it took only 35 minutes to get to England! So we spent a few days in England! We stayed with 3 different families for 2 days each. We were able to go to Oxford for a day (which I loved) and we went to London for a day. We also caught up with our friends. But I will make a more detailed post about this asap! 

With my sister and my granddad

Maastricht

A bookstore in an old church in Maastricht

Maastricht

At the "drielandenpunt"

Standing on two borders and in three countries

50 Ways To Say Goodbye

June 2, 2013 - June 13, 2013

Inevitably the time came to say goodbye to all my friends. The very first goodbye happend at 5 am (ish) on Tiananmen Square. One of my friends was leaving only a few days later and I would not be seeing her again. It was really hard to say goodbye after such a wonderful celebration and after a 3 year long friendship. After this goodbye followed several more. I had a dinner on Monday, I went to the alumni BBQ on Wednesday, went to the Swedish Embassy on Thursday and to dinner with friends, a goodbye brunch/picnic and my own goodbye dinner. It was a week filled with goodbyes. Some friends I also said goodbye to without knowing because they were not able to come to dinners so I didn't really get a change to say goodbye.

I went to dinner with my friends for the first goodbye on Monday after graduation. It was really fun and it gave us a chance to sign yearbooks because we didn't have enough time after the graduation dinner. All these photos are taken my friend Yunju (she is in the back row in the first picture, the first person from the left).

Photo by Yunju

Photo by Yunju

Photo by Yunju

We then had the alumni BBQ and although we had only graduated 5 days before the majority of the people at the alumni reunion were a part of the class of 2013. A lot of people came so that more yearbooks could be signed and it was fun to see each other one more time when we were not exhausted from being awake for 24 hours. I said goodbye to a lot of people after the BBQ. Here are some of the photos that were taken at the alumni BBQ. These photos were taken by school's photographer, Geraldine Cuason.

Credits Western Academy of Beijing

Credits Western Academy of Beijing

Credits Western Academy of Beijing

Credits Western Academy of Beijing

The next day I went to the Swedish embassy with my Swedish friend Lovisa because they had their national day celebration. AND the original ABBA band was there. The original bass player, drummer and I think guitar player were there! It was just fun and nice to listen to some music! After that we went to dinner. After this dinner I had to say goodbye to the another friend and you would think that it gets easier but it doesn't.

At the Swedish embassy. There is no filter on this photo!

I then had a weekend filled with packing and going to markets with my family to buy the last things that I wanted to buy in Beijing!

On my last day in Beijing I was still packing but I also went to a goodbye picnic that was hosted by one of my friends. It had the perfect brunch/picnic food and it was all delicious!!

That evening I invited my friends that were still in Beijing to come to dinner one last time. We had Chinese food and it was really nice. After dinner we went to my house just to hang out a bit and it was really hard to say goodbye. Three years had passed by so quickly and I was so sad to leave! I am going to miss (already miss) them so much and I hope that we will be able to stay in contact as much as possible even though we will all be busy with university life.

These photos were also taken by Yunju, and the second with her camera.

Photo by Yunju

Photo by Yunju

What You Wanted

June 1st 2013

The day that I wanted. When we moved to Beijing almost three years ago my parents asked us what we wanted to do while we lived in Beijing. My sister said she want to see the panda's in Chengdu. I said I wanted to graduate. Of course my dream would have happened simply with the passing of time and where my sisters dream required a trip. Nevertheless this was the one true thing that I was looking forward to. Of course seeing more of China was also on my wish list but graduation was something I had been looking forward to since the first day of 7th grade (first year of high school in Holland).

On June 1st 2013 I had my dream graduation. And it truly could not have been a better day. The last few weeks/months in Beijing consisted of far more polluted days than no pollution days but June 1st was a gorgeous sunny and no pollution day! It was so sunny that I had to put on sunscreen and we all were sweating like crazy throughout the ceremony. The ceremony took place in the Confucius temple. There were a lot of speeches but it was all worth the 20 seconds that it took to get my diploma.

Credits Western Academy of Beijing

Credits to my mom

Credits Geraldine Cuason

Credits to my mom

After the ceremony my family and I went to my friends' house for lunch.

After the lunch we went home, changed etc and then it was time for the graduation dinner. It was a nice dinner and during the dinner there were some more speeches. After the dinner there were two video's that were made of our class which was really nice because it was nice to be reminded of all the things that happened in the past year. After that it was time for the awards (14 in total). And completely unexpected I received one of the awards! I got the WAB Mission Award, as the student of the graduating class who best embodied the spirit/mission of WAB. It was a beautiful way to end the 3 years at WAB!

And after the dinner it was time for after grad! It was a lot of fun and after after grad we all went to tiananmen square to watch the raising of the flag at 4:47 am, the last of the traditions. 

It was a wonderful 24 hours that for me were a true celebration of the past 3 years. I am going to miss WAB so so much but I am also looking forward to begin university in (as of July 2nd 2013) 1,5 months. 

WAB, thank you for changing my life.