It's been a while.

Hallo!
It feels like it was just last week that this blog fell off the map and I arrived on it. I was writing here every day for the first three weeks, and I guess that was a little ambitious. At least there will be a good picture of arriving here and now here's a little snapshot of the midway point. Apparently I haven't written anything for almost 6 months, but there's no worries- someday it will be caught up. To go through pictures, be transported once again into the 11 countries and numerous cities I have seen over the past 6 months, I look forward to that.
I feel so incredibly blessed.

In order:
the Netherlands (Amsterdam, Utrecht, den Haag, Rotterdam, Leiden)
England (London, Cambridge, Manchester)
Scotland (Glasgow, Kyle of Lochalsh, Inverness, Edinburgh)
Belgium (Brussels, Brugge)
Ireland (Dublin, Galway)
Czech Republic (Praha, Kutna Hora)
Hungary (Budapest)
Spain (Madrid)
Germany (Munich, towns all over Bavaria and along the Rhine, Berlin)
Austria (Salzburg, Halstatt, Innsbruck)
Poland (Krakow)
For pictures of each location, there are albums on my facebook page dedicated to each city individually. Short descriptions should be by most of the pictures. It's a lot. Cutting down thousands of pictures is a bit of a task.

The cathedrals, the people, the museums, the travelers  the tours, the food, the history, the customs, the language, the memories. Partying in Budapest, eating in Krakow, crying in Berlin, rapping in Inverness, dancing along the Rhine, hiking in Kyle of Lochalsh, drinking in Munich, meeting vampires in Brugge, Mozart concerts in Salzburg. I am living a lifetime in a year, and that year is only halfway over.

I have moved for the last and final time of the year to de Uithof, on campus, and will be here for the next 5 months. My flatmates are a paleontologist from England and a musician from France, and they're great. The Brit's got wild curly red hair with a social personality to match, and the Frenchie's got glasses with blonde hair, taller than me, and somewhat quiet. Our flat is on the 14th floor, and out my window I look out onto meadows, forests, and canals which butt up against the campus. When spring comes, the sheep will return to grazing the fields, and my guess is sunset will look pretty good over the treetops. This is also the first week in the past month and a half without snow consistently on the ground. It's been over 0'C for a week now! (Comfortable again, haha).

I am taking courses in GIS/Cartography and Environmental Impact Assessment this block, which are both taking up a fair amount of time, but they are very hands on and even more interesting than expected. Definitely a good thing.

Either way, spring is coming, and that causes a healthy amount of excitement all by itself :D

Beste betreft,
-Matt