August 31

Today it's exactly one year ago that I graduated. And I totally forgot about it, I worked in Tilburg today, which was pretty good, when I got home I went to a shop to get a part for my fridge and Steve came over to do his laundry (he doesn't have a washing machine, and I never have enough laundry to fill up my machine) and have dinner with me and I cooked the simplest dinner in the world. I guess tomorrow I can celebrate that I've been a PhD student for exactly one year :)

Surfing Holland

Today I went to Katwijk to surf, my board has been in a container on the beach for ages, but every time I went there the sea was virtually flat as a mirror so I hadn't been in yet. The forecasts for today were very good (according to Dutch standards) so I got into the office early, and I left early as well. After cycling up against the wind, eating my second bagel for today I got into the water at around 17:00. Now this session had a good and a bad side. The bad thing was that the environmental quality was plainly poor: messy waves so virtually impossible to get through the surf (though also an incentive to work on my upper body strength) and foam should be white, not dark brown. How does it get dark brown? The Dutch sewer system cannot handle the huge amount of rain of late so basically the sea is used to dump any excess 'water'. Nothing a half hour shower can't undo though (unless you swallow the stuff, then you're in for a few days in bed).

Now the good thing was that the one wave I caught was a good one, which makes it all worthwhile again :)

(this does not mean I'm not looking forward to surfing some better spots, though)

Weekend in Leiden

For the first time in ages I spent a weekend in Leiden again, and it was good! Time really flies when you're having fun :)

On Saturday my very youthful aunt Annemiek came over to shop. We didn't find the kind of dress she wanted, but we did find some nice incense. We had a good day though, even though we couldn't satisfy our shopping needs. On Sunday the shops were open as well and I needed a few things (a nice laundry basket and a new dustbin) I ended up with a new pair of boots, three skirts, a top, 2 photo albums, a multi purpose tool and no laundry basket or dustbin :) After my girly mood I decided to try to fix a flat tyre on my second bike. I more or less succeeded, I fixed the hole but when I had to put the tyre back on the wheel I managed to puncture it again. I didn't have time to fix that hole because I was going to have dinner at Steve's place. I'm back home now, and I can't believe the weekend has gone by so fast! Actually I still have plenty of things to do (fix bike, the dishes, put a button on a jacket, sort out a lot of photos etc..) but I'm so tired (for some odd reason my body finds it necessary to wake up at 8.15 in the weekend) and there's an entertaining film on (Blue Crush, it isn't exactly the best film in the world, but some great water shots).
Choices choices....

Yay weekend!

This week was a busy week, on Tuesday and Wednesday I worked in Tilburg. So I've been travelling a lot between Leiden, Etten-Leur and Tilburg. On Wednesday evening my sister Sara starred in the musical at her (and my old) secondary school to celebrate the start of the new school year. The musical was very entertaining: nice setting, good music, male singers and dancers (in my day only girls thought musicals were cool). They also had really nice intermezzo's with pre-recorded video clips, really a great night. A very nice surprise was that I was in it as well, during one of the songs a photo of me was projected on the background, I feel honoured that even after having left the school five years ago the director still remembers me and finds a way to 'put me on stage' :)

Thursday morning I got up really early to get back to Leiden, straight to work from Etten-Leur, and I hate getting up early. I managed to make it into the office around half past nine though (I meant to be there earlier but my brother and sister were fighting over who got to go in the bathroom first very, very early in the morning, and because I had to wait for them I missed one train).

Just now I went to The Da Vinci Code with Steve, finally! I'd been waiting a very long time to see that and I absolutely loved it. The cinema we went to was pretty cool though, it's a tiny more or less arthouse place hidden behind a church and some old nunnery walls in Leiden and one guy seemed to be running the whole place. They don't have tickets either, you just pay at the entrance and he notes down on a list how many people there are, I love these tiny places. The toilets are also in the theatre itself so you don't have to walk all the way through corridors, well, there aren't any corridors really :) It's a bit hard to explain, you'll just have to go there yourself sometime!

Little Surftrip

Today is a good day. My phone is working again and because I there won't be any little trips to Ireland anytime soon (as my boyfriend will stay in the US a little bit longer to finish his PhD) I treated myself to a surf weekend in Newquay on September 23 and 24 :)

It's awfully expensive (flight, car, accommodation, surf & yoga lessons, massage) but at least the chances of there being swell are much better than here and my bank account can handle it perfectly well, so Newquay here I come! :)

Lazy Sunday :)

Back in the Netherlands. Back in the rain :)

It's nice to be back though, back to my family, my own bed, cooking etc. Fortunately this has not been a very straightforward week. On Tuesday I worked in Tilburg, Wednesday and Thursday in Leiden, and on Friday I was back in Tilburg for our department outing, and there was no rain!!! Antal and Erik have taken pictures which you can find here and here.

On Saturday there was another outing, that of me and Hans to the Efteling, our favourite theme park. Because of the summer it's open until late, so we didn't leave home too early. More people thought of that so the last two miles or so were a bit of a traffic jam. It was also very very busy, but we did the things we wanted to do and got to walk around the new attraction that's opening next season, The Flying Dutchman, which looks very promising. We didn't stay as long as we wanted to as around quarter past seven it started to rain very heavily, which may have made it an expensive day as my mobile phone got absolutely soaked in the pocket of my jacket. Although slowly its functionality is returning, so perhaps I won't have to look out for a new one. Today I finally got to sleep late, something I've been looking forward to for about a week now, and it was good!

Merpel in Granada

To anyone who hasn´t been to Granada: go there! Yesterday I arrived around 4pm at the bus station of Granada, it took me about an hour to find my hotel (mainly due to taking a wrong bus, but the little sightseeing tour was definitely worth it, gorgeous little cobblestone alleys that provided quite a challenge for the drivers of the little Mercedes vans they use). The hotel is directly opposite the entrance of the Alhambra, which was very handy as I had to be at the Alhambra at 08:30 this morning. The Alhambra is absolutely beautiful! It felt a bit like walking around in Versailles, but then in a totally non-European way :) When I get home I´ll upload the photos, though they don´t really capture the beauty of it. Around lunch time I met Armin who arrived around 1am last night so he slept in while I visited the Alhambra, he had already visited it last week. After lunch in town we wandered around a bit, unfortunately the cathedral is closed, no idea why, also no sign, a bit of a pity because it´s a gigantic building that has quite a weird shape for a church so we would have liked to see the inside. After some ice-cream and drinks Armin went to pick up a friend from the airport, and I got back to my hotel. I arrived there when a couple of American girls were being rather rude to the lady at the reception because they (the girls) fucked up their reservation. Interesting situation, but totally irrelevant. Nevermind, the place is pretty cool. A bit messy, but they´re renovating. And the best thing about it is the pool on the roof, which is exactly where I´m heading now :)

Leaving Malaga

I'm almost ready to go now, and the residence just closes up for the summer at 12 so there's also no lingering around the pool anymore :(. The last few days have been very good. Thursday night we (Brian, Jack, Mick and I) went out to eat some paella in town and see some flamenco dancers. The flamenco place is absolutely shabby and you wouldn't find it if you didn't know exactly where it was, but it was a very, very good show. The guitarist was just formidable, as were the dancers, singer and drummer. After that we went to a night club and all of a sudden it was 5 o'clock in the morning :).

It will be no surprise that I didn't make it to the early lecture on Friday. I did attend Word Sense Disambiguation and the closing session of the Student Session though. The invited speakers in the STuS were very nice, as well as the little stand up comedy act by the winners of the best talk and best poster. After that there was one last swim in the pool. And Sophia joined us for dinner in our neighbourhood. After that we picked up Graham and Armin who had been sleeping for most of the day after being wrecked because they spent the whole night in Marbella, and we went out in town to see what the Feria is all about. We knew that it was a big thing, because of the start of the holidays and supposedly it's a Malaga thing so people from all over Andalucia came to Malaga for it. We didn't know that it would be impossible to get a taxi, and that it involved an awful amount of people in the streets (a bit like Amsterdam on Queen's day). So we didn't go to the beach to see Enrique Iglesias, because we just couldn't get there. Instead we walked around for a bit, had some drinks and then proceeded to find some flamenco dancers (which we didn't find) and a bus or taxi back to our residence. Finally we found a bus, which was absolutely stuffed and at quarter past 4 I was very happy to see my bed back. Although at 9.30 the cleaners were already banging on my door, so I got up, had a shower, packed, went to the supermarket to get some food and now I'm writing this blogpost :)

I don't know if I will have access to the internet in Granada, so you might have to do without hearing anything from me until at least Monday evening, but probably even Tuesday evening. I will also upload photos then, but if you want a first peek at the ESSLLI adventures of bob the evil seahorse, check out: Mick's photos.

Holiday!

Well, more or less. As I just did my presentation (and it went quite well, got some interesting questions and advice) I feel I am entitled to some good relaxing. The only thing that was a bit annoying was that I couldn't see my slides on the screen of my laptop, but I knew what they were saying anyway so I didn't have to look up to the screen too much. Mick said that I found my rhythm quite fast, even after being slightly annoyed by not getting my laptop set up properly, and that it was an entertaining presentation, and luckily I didn't move around too much, as I did when I was rehearsing the stuff in my room. I also managed to not talk for too long, so yes, I feel good :)

Off to the pool now!

ESSLLI week 2

Ola!

Sorry to keep you not updated the past few days, but I've been very busy. The weekend mainly consisted of partying and relaxing, and then since Monday I've been attending lectures again.

Saturday I got up late, and went into town for some shopping (Zara!) and some sightseeing. The first Zara I came across was in a big shopping centre, unfortunately it was the only shop in the shopping centre that was suffering from a power outage grrr. Fortunately I found another Zara in the city centre, and I bought some really nice (and cheap!) tops. After the shopping it was time for some culture, so I went to the cathedral and the alcazaba. The cathedral of Malaga is like many other cathedrals (catholic, lots of gold and marble, entrance fee, etc.). The Alcazaba in Malaga is an 12th century Muslim palace/fortress. It has some beautiful gardens, mosaics and towers. After walking around in it for about an hour I decided to go back to the residence to get some food. In the supermarket we (Brian, Mick, Espen and Roeland) found some extremely cheap wine, some chorizo, bread, cheese, and some plates and knives. We were ready to throw a little party :). A pool-party!!!

Sunday afternoon I took it easy, did a bit of reading, a bit of swimming, working on my tan :). Around 7pm Brian, Mick, Toine and me went out to find some food, but most restaurants don't open until 8.30pm. We ended up in a bar where they served triple bailey's for 1 euro, so we stayed there until 9. Around the corner of the bar we found a little fish restaurant that didn't have a menu, but it had a waiter who said "I'm the menu". But that's about as far as his knowledge of the English language reached, so we ended up going inside pointing at various kinds of seafood to order. The fish turned out to be really good, very simple mainly salted and grilled, but for about 10 euros each (including drinks) we were able to fill up our stomachs pretty well. No real partying that night, other than watching three episodes of AbFab, because we of course had to get up early again on Monday for the courses of the second week. So from Monday on my days looked like this (with the occasional skipped course because of for instance Italian girls in the room next to me were getting up noisily at 5 am.)
0900 - 1030 Anaphora Resolution
11:00 - 12:30 Counting Words
14:00 - 15:30 Word-sense Disambiguation
15:45 - 16:45 Student Session
17:15 Swimming pool

In the evenings I also found some time to finish my last slides, participate in the ESSLLI basketball match and go into town for some more fish :)
The basketball matches were pretty OK, apart from there only being two girls involved. We were playing man-to-man (or man-to-girl) and the guy I was playing against got really annoyed by being guarded by a girl, but I outran him big time once and stopped a few of his attacks. I also got quite a few cheers as some people started to realise that girls (or at least some of them) can pass and catch balls properly. It's a shame I woke up this morning to find that my foot really hurts, it feels like I've sprained something though I didn't feel anything yesterday. Too much exercise....

ESSLLI Party night

Yesterday night was the big night: the night of the ESSLLI party. The organisation had arranged for buses and a cosy club in the centre of Malaga with free food (olives, tortillas, slices of Spanish ham , crisps and gazpacho from a carton). The DJ wasn't the best ever, but we still had a very good time. Around 12 the club also opened up for non-ESSLLI participants so sometime after that we (Armin, Brian, Graham, Jack, Mick, Toine and I) left the club and ended up in a crowded square with a little cocktail bar in the centre of it. In case you're wondering what you are seeing in the picture that comes with this post, those are the empty pineapples in which the pina colada was served :)

After that Armin, Brian and Graham went home, and the rest went to the beach where I saved us all from a shark. (In case you think that this shark only existed by virtue of a minimal amount of alcohol in my blood, there was actually a weird white fish swimming not too far from the shore, it was very close to the surface, it had shark fins, so it was a shark. A baby shark, but still a shark ;) ) Then we went home and I slept until 11 this morning :)

Time flies..

..when you're having fun. The first week of ESSLLI is nearly over, and it just went so fast. Besides attending lectures I've been to the beach in Malaga (twice, once to the "wrong" beach, which was a bit yucky, and once to a better beach, although I've heard that the best beaches are just outside the city). The sea isn't as clear here as it is in Formentera, but it's good enough. It's also more refreshing than the pool at the Residence, as that has gotten very hot the past few days when the temperature rose well over 40 centigrade. Still, it's very nice to have a pool nearby. I've got to go now, because lunch will start soon, and I want to be at the front of the queue.

TTFN!

PS The first symptoms of the dreaded macbook stains are starting to show up on James :(

First pics from Malaga

Dinner at the University Residence on very stylish plates ;)


A typical ESSLLI lunch.



Great food at the reception on Sunday, although it was designed for people with at least three hands; one for holding your plate, another one for holding your glass, and a third one for eating (and maybe a fourth one for peeling the prawns). But I'm not really complaining :)



What do you think of my ESSLLI goodies? ;)

ESSLLI day 2

Right now I'm at the first evening lecture of ESSLLI, but it turns out that coalgebra isn't really my thing (like mereology as I found out this morning, the lack of lecture notes and me not having attended the first lecture didn't help). Still it's an interesting lecture even though I got lost after slide 4. About an hour ago (18:45) it was still 38 centigrade outside, so I'm also enjoying the airconditioning here very much, and the fast internet. So I just uploaded some pictures of Paris and my trip to California (more organised than before). Both albums can be found on merpel.nl, which (yes) I still need to turn into a real website instead of a photo repository.

Today I also decided not to go to the "Introduction to corpus resources, annotation and access" course anymore because I've already covered most of the topics in courses at Tilburg University. Instead of that I went to "Data-driven methods for acquiring linguistic information", which is a good choice I think. Though I was suffering from a big 'post-lunch dip' after the heavy Spanish lunch (siesta-time isn't scheduled unfortunately). The first course was a potato with aioli salad (big plate), the second fried potato slices with tuna (at least that's what I chose) and a slice of watermelon for dessert. I didn't go to the second course in the afternoon because I was a bit tired and I wanted to get some rest before the evening lecture.

Now I'm off to dinner, and maybe the swimming pool.