England

I traveled to Chelmsford, England this weekend with my host family to visit their daughter and her family.  Their family moved from the Netherlands about 2-3 years ago for work, and it was fun to see the Dutch and English life mixed.  One of their daughters even spoke Dutch with a bit of an English accent now!

It surprised me how often I was surprised to understand things in England.  I've lived in the Netherlands for so long that I'm accustomed to needing to pay close attention in order to understand.  In England, I would just overhear and understand.  Weird.

I was an instant hit with the girls.  Marloes (5) followed me everywhere, Laura (nearly 2) babbled to me constantly in her own language (she's not quite sure what language to speak, perhaps), and Iris (9) would summon me for games or play her violin for me.  I'm not used to being fought over, so it was an interesting weekend and also quite exhausting :).

Saturday, I left early in the morning to head for London.  I took the train (a familiar method for this Zwolle girl) and began a search for Sarah in the train station.  This didn't work out quite as planned, but after nearly an hour, I finally spotted her and we hit the Tube for our first stop.

The weather couldn't have been nicer - bright sun and blue sky.  We chattered in an attempt to catch up and just enjoyed the sights, weather, food, and experiences.  The day, we decided, was quite a success.

London Tower Bridge

Near Buckingham Palace

Parliament (and the clock tower with Big Ben)