Categories
in the netherlands

jelly good.

dear friends.
after six months here in portugal to wrap things up at the university, i am now, officially, an “engineer”. a pretty clueless one, career-wise, but i’m working on that bit. ideally, i would like to develop my designing skills, as i realize i still have a long way to go to get any good. i like information visualization and interface designing, but i want to explore a lot more before i choose what i really want to focus my attention on.

on a different (but related) subject, and since i’ve told it to my parents and most friends, i can give the rest of the internet the big news too: we’re moving to shanghai, me and p.
yes, shanghai. the biggest city in china, the 8th in the world, the “pearl of the orient”.
after my one year in the netherlands, and p’s 6+9 months in the netherlands and the usa, i think the “exploring bug” really got into us.
it just seems right. the right timing, the right city, the right person to hold my hand on the plane. and besides, if you don’t trust your intuition, what else do you have?

the details of the process of moving there include job hunting, a house, plane tickets and luggage allowance, visas and plenty other details that will keep us busy on the next few weeks. i’ll try to keep you posted. wish us luck! :)

Categories
in the netherlands

los angeles style, man!

i know one shouldn’t judge a country by its stereotype, but sometimes, you find a specimen so typical, so ironically representative, that you forget all about impartiality.
as i was leaving the netherlands, i met an american guy from los angeles, arriving for a small exchange period. he asked us to use the internet on your computers every once in a while and we got the chance to talk on one of those “visits”.


him – you know…the dutch people… they’re so…
me – what?
him – like… not technologically advanced.

me – hum? what do you mean?
him – bicycles. who uses bikes these days? that’s so… backwards. i gotta get a car here.

i was shocked and speechless and then i laughed inside, secretly wondering if he knew about the dutch gas prices (only the highest in the world), and, let’s be honest, of how stupid he was, really.
the dutch are backwards because they use bicycles? ever heard of environmental friendly way of transportation which is also cheap and good for you? … i thought so. forget the car, try to find some brains instead.

ps – luckily, this stereotype was changed by another student i met later that week, from seattle, which was polite, moved normally and was nice to talk to. but then again, someone told me seattle was not a exactly a typical city… :)

ps2 – i’m back! no more exams for now! :D