Week 11

Dear all,

This is my last week in Cambridge. Next Saturday I will sit my exam and hope that the results will meet Fonty’s requirements, but to be honest I’m a bit fed up with the unrealistic goals that the Fontys has set. When natives tell you that they are not keepable of passing the cpe exam with a B you know that the aim of the Fontys of passing all skills individualy with a B is absulte nonsense

Anyhow, the weeks have flown by like crazy. Last week Jollina visited me and we had lots of fun when we sneaked around in Trinity college. A little tip: Triny college has a backdoor which for some reason was left unguarded,so that saved us a great amount of money that we could of course later on spend on some cocktails. That’s one thing that I’m definitely going to miss, my new love called French martini. We also went clubbing together, which was fun but only because of the fact that we decided to make it fun. When entering the first club it took us about 10 minutes before we ran off. Don’t know why people recommend it but I should have run off when I saw the girl laying in the entry hall . That situation was a good representation of what was going on inside . The British in gala costumes playing drinking games or that was what it looked like, I was not really bothered to ask, to be honest.

This week will be fun, I’ve already suggested to hold a big campfire on Saturday so we can sacrifice our books in a ritual ceremony, hoop I'm not growing to attached to them during my study sessions in the upcoming week. With fun I really mean fun because somehow I had decided 5 months ago that I wanted to be home after the exams as soon as possible because I fly at 6 in the morning.Hopefully the girls will kick me out of the club at 2 so that I’m still able to find the buss that brings me to the airport. Sleep is for pussies right? After 3 months I got the hang of the British culture so I’m going to leave England in style: (a bit) tipsy and on the wrong side of the road (towards the airport.)

Lots of love,

Nina

Week 9

Dear readers,

It’s been awhile since I last wrote. I’ve been really busy and the exams are just around the corner (3 weeks left). To be honest, I’m starting to become a bundle of nerves.

2 weeks ago I visited home which was lovely! Even our little dog ‘Puck’ seemed to have missed me, although that’s what it looked like since she didn’t shiver when I opened the door.

During my first weekend back, I celebrated Halloween because that seems to be a thing here. People started to dress up days before the actual day took place. And with people I mean us. Halloween took place on a Wednesday and although partying is not excluded from my to do list, it somehow seemed better to not have a massive hangover on Thursday. So we went out on Saturday! And I must say, I’m lucky to have friends who turned out to be great make-up artists. So I finally got the chance to experience what looking scary feels like. It was amazing! Because we didn’t want to let go of the Halloween feeling we visited a criminal court case with school a couple of days later.

Having studied the English court system, I thought that I understood it quite properly but I soon found out that the court system in England with its jury is unpredictable. I found it quite an achievement that nobody from my course really agreed with the verdict: not-guilty. I even got the idea that Cambridge was aiming for the title of “Biggest drug dealing city.” But unfortunately for the English, Amsterdam will always be number one and for some reasons we are quite well-known for our green-stuff. “Where do you come from?.. “the Netherlands duhh..” “ooooo I’ve been there; I’ve been to Amsterdam” Rara why do people go there? But it was an educative experience to sit in the public and to try to put yourself in all kind of different positions to see the defendant. I loved the part when the jury told him “not-guilty” and he screamed the F word in combination with you b*tch. I would have known how to handle this lovely guy when I was in their position, although I might get frightened myself. No one wants to be persecuted by a street vendor.

Last weekend I visited London again. Seems to be the place to be since I’ve been there like 4 times in 2 months. So I thought let’s try something new. So instead of visiting a pub we set off to a gin tonic festival. It was a lovely experience and I think that I was not the only one that was enjoying the gin as the room was almost empty at 10 o’clock. British people and alcohol……..

Next weekend I’m going to do some tourist stuff, such as punting and visiting King’s college. The punting guys will be happy to have finally convinced me to go punting since they’ve been using many creative methods to pursue me. Sometimes time doesn’t change people, apparently I still look Dutch or I look like a tourist, to be honest I don’t want to be associated with one as there is nothing more annoying than a group of tourists following a flag, not knowing on which side of the road to walk or how to make room for people who actually walk on the right side of the road (=left).

Lots of love,

Nina

week 5

Hi,

Oké, I could say that I definitely lost track of time, since I posted my last post over a month ago, Whoops.

Life has been quite busy. I try to manage to go to school everyday and to keep up with the homework. Besides that I've got a bunch of people I want to stay in touch with who live in the Netherlands. So you could say that of all skills my multitask-skills have definitely improved the most. No just kidding, school goes pretty good as well, although aiming for a B pass (at CPE level) on all skills is pretty exhausting.

Besides school, I've also managed to visit the gym quite often. Fun place to be, that's for sure, because people here tend to dress up a bit differently than what I'm used to. If I put it in other words, they prefer to work out with as less clothes as possible. Funny fact is that they do exactly the same when they go out. I've been in some queues where girls were just almost wearing nothing while it was like 12 degrees outside. I was standing there (jumping around because of the cold) in my wintercoat while they wore crop tops and mini skirts. I imagine them freezing to death in the winter, but they told me that they were fine and used to the cold . Please count me out, I rather be judged as a non. The same counts for my friends here! Although I have no idea what they will come up with to wear to the upcoming halloween parties. By the way my friend are just lovely here. It's is an amazing experience to study abroad but friends can make that experience even better. Over the weeks we have done so many fun things, which honestly almost always included gin tonic or wine . But wine makes you feel fine! After having heard from our new friends for like 4 weeks how amazing Thursday nights out are we decided to join although we had morning classes the day after. Omg that was heavy. The teacher called it the Ballare (name of the club) effect, being tired and speaking nonsense. Luckily we have Costa to provide us with lovely strong coffee . But that night was totally worth the burn, it was amazing.

Having lived here for 5 weeks now I can say that I really like the English culture. People are always really kind and try to help wherever they can. For example when you're standing at a platform with your best friend (with an extremely heavy suitcase, luckily that thing had wheels underneath) heading towards Cambridge and having no idea where to go. No public transport is not really my cup of tea, god bless google maps.

And if you want to boost your self-esteem this is the place to be! Everyone calls you lovely, darling, sweetheart or whatever comes in mind. Besides that at my school there is quite a diversity in terms of how well people master the English language. So often when I fall back into my old habits (teaching), people are amazed by my level of English. Really cute of course but there is still a reason why I'm here gggrrrr.

Next week I will be home for a couple of days, it's about time because I really miss the lovely cheese sprinkles we have in the Netherlands and I might have missed everyone at home as well. Luckily Fleur came to visit me last week and we had lots of fun. We have done like many touristic things such as visiting London, a walk through the park and of course some shopping! It was lovely to have some days off to explore the city as a tourist.

Lots of love,

Nina

Week 1

Hi everyone,

Today I've been living in Cambridge for 1 week. You could say that I've had kind of a rough start. I struggled with being on my own and I missed home right away. The residence isn't that amazing as it is described on the internet and I feel like I'm living in Chinatown (surrounded by Chinese people, I think or Asian, difficult to decide) So that's how I've spent last weekend. Doubting whether I am surrounded by Asian or Chinese people.

Luckily things changed when I went to school. I've made some friends and found out that we have a lot in common: drinking wine, talking nonsense, trying to be a wannabe fit girl (which isn't really working out, because of the wine I think) and reading (although I prefer buying books instead of reading them). The good part is that I probably will enjoy dry "dirty" white wine when I move back to the Netherlands. Ow, I almost forgot to tell, I decided to rent a bike since everyone is cycling through town and I'm pretty done with walking.

Tomorrow I'm planning on visiting Kim in London woehoe! But first I will be checking out the pubs in town with some friends.

Lots of love,

Nina

Welcome

Hello everyone,

I've opened a travelling-form to stay in touch with friends and family in the Netherlands.

I'll be studying in Cambridge for 3 months. Here I'll hopefully learn more about the language and develop more strategies to master the English language at C2 level. This will benefit my study at the Fontys (I'm studying to become an English teacher.)

I'll be staying at the Study Inn which is located in Cambridge. The residence claims to rent "Luxury student studios", so I've got my hopes up on that one. Although I'm a bit worried about the "Luxury student" part. I always thought that students tend to be happy whenever they have a place to crash and when the place has a "clean" shared kitchen they say it's a blessing from above.

I will be leaving in three days which means that the "inpak" stress will hit me in about two and a half days. So for now I spend my time finishing the last details for my trip and watching the BBC, as a last attempt to sound less Dutch .

Lots of love,

Nina