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The entire staff of the Brussels law firm where I was working was invited to the annual Advolympics, a sports competition between lawyers...

Amsterdam, Maastricht, Nijmegen

Gaby
2004-01-25 13:41:13

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Amsterdam

The entire staff of the Brussels law firm where I was working was invited to the annual Advolympics, a sports competition between lawyers. My colleague Myriam and I shared a room in the superb Krasnapolsky hotel in the heart of Amsterdam. We took a boat trip on the canal, walked around the old city centre and went to the Artis zoo. In the evening one of the Dutch lawyers took us to De Jordaan, the popular neighbourhood with its bruine kroegen or "brown cafés".

These days when Jack and I take the train to Amsterdam, it is to visit his sister, Elsbeth, who lives there with her two sons.

During our 1996 visit we went aboard the "Cat Boat" on De Singel, where stray cats wait for some kind soul give them a home. Most cats had temporarily been transferred to another boat as this one was being refurbished.

Maastricht

My colleague Myriam fell ill and had to be replaced for a week. That is how I met Ellen. She had just arrived in Brussels the day before and hadn't even had time yet to buy herself a loaf of bread.

Poor Ellen. She had never seen an azerty keyboard before and she had problems understanding the new voice on the dictaphone and coping with the legal jargon. It was all just a matter of time, of course, and things would improve soon enough. Alas. Her boss had no patience and after three days Ellen was told to leave.

That evening we went for a drink together, as she was all alone and I felt that the least I could do was offer her some moral support. She found her next job in Brussels within a week and stayed there until she moved to Maastricht, some years later.

Maastricht has an abundance of restaurants and cafés. We didn't visit anything in particular, we just walked around the centre and came across some pretty sights, old narrow streets, a water mill tucked away amidst the greenery...

Nijmegen

As a student, I shared a house with twelve others. People came and went, but on average we were seven Flemings, four Walloons - and two Dutch students, Ad and Sandy.

Sandy had the room next to mine and we shared a kitchen. She had started her first year of English and Italian in the same school for translators as myself, but she soon realised that her real vocation was in nursing.

At the end of that year she went back to Holland and I missed her very much, because she had been a great friend to me. We had shared a cat, Prott, and had hidden her from the landlord's wife, who couldn't stand pets. When Sandy moved I lost Prott too.

Years later I visited her in Nijmegen, where she had rented a flat with her boyfriend and worked in the local hospital.

Nijmegen is a friendly place, big enough to be interesting and small enough to be pleasant. Lots of cafés, lots of young people.

The second time I visited Sandy, she had moved to a house of her own and had found herself a new boyfriend. She now had a small garden and we had dinner (baked fish) outside. Prott had found another owner and was reported to be very happy.

My visit coincided with the Nijmegen "Vierdaagse", when people come from everywhere for a four day march. Usually Sandy is on call to treat people with blisters as well as other casualties, but that year she was off duty.

She has kept busy, went off with Médécins sans Frontières, took management courses and baked fish for visitors. The last time I visited her, she had moved to a house with a big garden.