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Stranger in a Strange Land Newsletter

Saturday, June 22nd, 2002

(read as much as you want: just a little newsletter about my travel)

Hey Everyone,
How's it going? Right now I'm at Tim Frese's house in Warmond, Zuid-Holland, the Netherlands. Today is the 22nd of June and I've been gone since 12th of June, 10 days exactly! Wow, it feels MUCH longer but I'll get into that later...

The plane ride from Boston to London was really good. They fed us well, the seat was fine, and it didn't seem very long. Anyway, when through the airport getting the right ticket for the "tube" and then getting on the "tube" with my "baggage" was a "pain in the ass." Other than that I enjoyed the tube: that time and in general, it's cool to see all kinds of different people get on and get off. And they really do constantly say "mind the gap."

At the end of the tube ride I looked to see where the bus stop was and I saw that a bus was just coming in, so I better run and get it. So, dragging a big heavy bag and carry a little heavy bag I ran after the bus. As I got close to the bus it really didn't look like it was going anywhere so I thought, "Oh, ok, I can relax." Then I start to put my arm up to get on the bus and I swear the door closed right then and the bus started moving... well, the bus driver did then notice me, opened the door and let me in... I was finally on so I asked the bus driver when the Victoria St stop was and he gave me a blank look. I asked him if this bus GOES to Victoria St. and he said, "Ohhh, no," with his eyes wide and looking very serious...

Anyway, I got off the bus, took a short walk back to the station and with the help of a couple nice people found the right bus and the right stop. Then I met my Servas hosts were really nice: an English father, a Finn mother, two kids, and two visiting Finnish friends. Anyway, the first day (Thurs) I just randomly went around London and then the second day... I rode around the English countryside! The Servas host dad just happened to be going on a bike trip with his friend and invited me along. It was awesome. The little red poppies in the middle of the wide green fields were so pretty. Then we even passed through a couple small villages. There were some people in one of the towns selling second-hand trinkets and home-baked goods for their "Raise the Roof" program: they wanted money to get better basketball equipment to encourage the sport among the town's youth. They said they also plan to use some of the money for a new church roof. We saw the roof, it was cool, but a church we saw later was even more amazing. It really was beautiful and the thing was 700 YEARS OLD! The oak roof beams were 500 years old! And they had real stained glass and all this amazing stuff. Around the church there were some trees that were just magical too. There was yew tree right in front of it that looked like it might have been as old as the roof. In fact, the guy who rode with us said they used to plant yews near church to protect them. Walking under it and looking straight up the trunk through the branches was amazing... Near the end we got some beer and chips at the "Rest and Be Welcome" bar.

Alright, I wanna go to be soon so I'll have start covering more days in fewer paragraphs: I've only covered three days! Alright here goes: then I met Tim and his friend Petra after a terribly long and confusing search for our poor-quality hostel. Tim, Petra and I looked around at sites, went to good restaurants that were luckily cheap for London, and then drank at bars at night. One day we saw the Vagina Monologues and that was hilarious and awesome. Then on our last night Petra had her fanny-pack with money, passport, a camera, and a bottle of coke stolen. We rushed to Paddington Station and got interviewed by this cute girl with an Irish accent...Anyway, it was terrible! We all really did whatever we could do but it turned out that Petra wouldn't be able to get a replacement temporary passport in time because se was from Amsterdam! Amsterdam is too big...

So, on Monday, 17th of June, Tim and I got on a plane for Holland and arrived about 45 minutes later. Then on Tuesday Tim tortured me with an endless bike ride and an hour at the beach. During, and especially after, I became utterly exhausted and more painfully ill than I can ever remember. But I got better enough to go see my second-cousin, Marleen, in southern Holland and go to work with her. She works at the only Dutch car factory which was huge and just amazing to see. It was the first time I saw her and she was one hell of a Gerzon! It was like having Arabian coffee: I didn't know it came that damn strong! Actually, American Gerzons are usually known for being intelligent, athletic, and neurotic. But what somehow seemed very Gerzon was how she had the most amazing senses of humour I've ever encountered! And she was really nice and had some good stories about the Gerzon family and all. I only saw another second cousin, Leineke, for an hour but I wished that I could have seen her for more because she seemed really cool too.

Tomorrow, (damn, it just became today, it's 12:01!!!) I'm going to begin working at a volunteer work-camp in western Holland. It sounds like we're going to send most of our time working on restoring an old barn for making a give-away shop and I'm going to be the youngest by two years. Also, they're only giving us vegan food...I'm going to slip in a hotdog damnit... Alright everyone, hope all is well! I'm not sure if I'll be able to access a computer to e-mail yall again, sooo talk to you later!!

-Eli Stranger in a Strange Land