What a week

This week included:

# long evenings with meetings, emailing, thinking out new concepts, networking etc - but all with pretty constructive results;

# being swept away by spring, but also coming back down to the real world as quickly and unexpectedly as it began;

# being confronted with more careerquestions (imagine a conversation starting at 9am, Fridaymorning, with my new boss: "So, machi, what is your vision of the future, say 10 years from now?" Uhm, can I have my coffee first?)

# being shocked about whatever happened to the Netherlands: how can it happen that a man is killed because someone takes offence to his appearance? This is just so shocking and sad.

Luckily tomorrow will be spent outside, chilling in the sun. Yay.

Back to work

After a week of mostly fun and playing outside, it's back to doing some work. Because there are so many different things going on I haven't exactly settled into a routine yet on how to spend my week with working three days a week, and needing time to get some other things back on track.

So, the evenings this week are mostly devoted to meetings:

- working out a new plan for the alumni-organisation that I'm involved in. Basically, trying to figure out a way to strengthen and expand the network of alumni. Pretty interesting to be involved in, am curious if the plan we have in mind will actually work!

- getting my volunteer work on human rights set up; I've been working on it on and off for a few months but can't really get it started. I'm a bit lost with what I'm supposed to be doing and how I can do this best. The next few weeks should make that a bit clearer, I hope.

- more alumni-type stuff, but for a different kind of 'network'. Less formal and more silly/goofy. Yay.

- oh, and then there's a re-formatting of the Bus People Project, which is long long long overdue...

Spring is in the air...

... and I'm loving it!

I think the sun is supposed to leave tomorrow, but somehow I don't think it's going to matter.

A quick review of the weekend:

listened to - !!! and Zita Swoon on Friday (review in Dutch is here)
disappointed with - the workshops I attended on the Afrikadag on Saturday
very pleasantly surprised by - good food and company on Saturday night (to be continued hopefully)

And spent Sunday catching up with friends, getting some new energy from the sun, and celebrating a friend's birthday at the bowling center. The last bit was very geeky, but very fun.

Also, looking forward to - spending time in Antwerp and Leuven at the end of the month. Yay for international friends.

Why I love

the Luisterpaal: Cassadaga is online!

I think I might just be getting tickets for this gig in July....

Out of the comfort zone

I've been meaning to write a post on this for a while but I don't really know how to write it, or what exactly the point is that I want to make. So, bear with me if it turns into a long ramble.

Since living in Tokyo (and basically also, since starting this blog) I've started meeting more and more people from the internet. It's really become an addition to my social life in the real world. And in that sense, it's been very good as well as I've made some fabulous new friends, met really interesting people, and it has made life just a bit more adventurous.

It is always strange when meeting these people though. I've become fascinated by how contact is never initiated in the same way, or kept up in the same way as a different contact. This is especially true for one-on-one contact - you can be msn'ing for months and finally accidentally meet for coffee, or out of the blue start emailing and see eachother within days.

Some of my other friends are usually quite surprised (well, not anymore, come to think of it) when I tell them I am going out to dinner with a guy I met online, or that I'm going to see a concert of a band that I don't know with people flying over from the US. It makes it very fun as well. I think that most people reading this have some sort of experience with meeting random people of the net though, so maybe you can relate a bit more ;-)

In any case, I've thought about it before, but these past few weeks have been a bit intense in this sense, and will continue to be too, I think. I love meeting all these new people, but it's also scary as hell. It's easy to portray a certain image on-line, but is that really you off-line as well? On-line you actually have time to think about your quick and witty response, but in real life? It's never happened that I don't get along with someone in real life, but hardly anyone is the way I expected them to be. So I doubt I am what people expect neither.

I've also come to realize that it is a way for me to expand my comfort zone, so to speak. I don't seem to be looking so much for a relationship as I am looking just for new people in general. People who are outside of my (great, but in a way also confining) group of friends at home, people who can give a new form of inspiration maybe also (or just give me good tips on exciting new music and gigs). And I think I've also started to see it as a way of pushing boundaries, becoming more assertive, becoming more comfortable amongst completely unknown people.

I was surprised recently when several people seperately from eachother started saying how they really thought I was really sociable, could talk to everyone and have no problems in just approaching anyone. It was good to hear, but so different from what I think of me, and how others usually see me - different from the image that I think I portray. On the other hand, I know I'm getting better at it, and by pushing myself to meet new people (it be either a group of foreign travellers to catch up on traveltales, or a potential romantic interest) I think I'm actually doing myself a big favour by it as well.

Of course, it doesn't mean I will start doing stupid things like drinking champagne on some stranger's balcony ;-)

And another one

Another first experience in the jobhunting-debacle, that is.

I'm getting ready to start an on-line test as a follow-up to a job application that I sent out recently. I have no idea what to expect. Never done assessment or psychological tests yet, and this should supposedly only take an hour or so, so I'm not sure what they are looking to get out of it. I also don't know if all applicants need to do this, or if there has been a first selection already. I'm guessing (and hoping) for the latter, which makes me feel just a bit better about my recent attempts again.

As with phone interviews, which I talked about a while ago, I think there's probably a similar philosophy for these online tests to do from home: don't be lounging on your couch while taking it, don't be dressed in your pyjamas, etc.

So, here I am, awake after coffee and breakfast, dressed, at my desk, (almost) logged out of my various windows, ready to tackle this thing...

*deep breath*

Some pictures on a sunny afternoon

Decadence foiled

During that evening in the pub with friends, that I mentioned in the previous post, we came to a brilliant idea.

We've been saying for ages that we want to be eating out more, make more of an occassion of doing things and so on. So, as we have a weekend planned in Friesland in September, we decided that would be the perfect opportunity to have dinner on the way, in this restaurant.

De Librije is one of the few 3-star Michelin restaurants in the Netherlands. If we want to be eating out more, and want to make these nights a proper occassion, what better way than to go here, right?

Alas, our opportunity at being decadent will have to wait: Friday nights are booked up completely for at least the next year!

(Which then begs the question, who plans dinner a year (!?) in advance?)

Unemployment

If it wouldn't be because of the ultimate lack of money resulting from not working, I could definitely continue my lifestyle of the last week indefinitely.

My first (and for the moment, last) full week of being unemployed was very mixed with activities but very good too.

Didn't do as much jobhunting-related stuff as I had hoped, although I did find a temporary part-time job which could be very interesting due to the organisation it is at. It does mean that I start next week already!

Much of the rest of the days have gone mostly like today:

* meeting in the morning to organize some things for a sake tasting in a few weeks time, which started with coffee and catching up;
* respond to voicemail from a friend, and head to cafe with one of the people from the meeting to meet voicemail-friend on a canal-terrace;
* on the way there, pop in to bookshop to order Kurosawa's dvds;
* hang out in the sun for a few coffees;
* head home to do some computer stuff, in the meantime making more plans for evening and the next day;
* cook a dinner, which should turn out yummy;
* meet friends in pub for beer and fun.

:: repeat ad infinitum ::

Flowers, cards, champagne

I'm home from an afternoon of saying goodbye to people. Oh, and stressing about making sushi for those people.

I'm on the computer because I cannot bear to look at the card from my colleagues. Maybe it's the champagne. But I really really really don't want to read it right now.

In better news: I'll be the proud owner of the Kurosawa Akira 3-box dvd set very very soon :-D