Silent night...

The family Reeve’s Christmases are always a bit odd for outsiders. We dress up in smokings, talk nonsense during the dinner and play strange games, such the famous ‘Where are you now, Moriati?’ (where two people are blindfolded and hit each other with rolled-up newspaper) and the more subtle ‘La-di-da’ (aunts, uncles, etc. sit on the floor passing matchboxes to each other as fast as they can while chanting ‘La-di-da’)

But I guess all families have there own little traditions and embarrassing family members. I am not indicating that I have any embarrassing family members!! The woman below, however, is my dear aunt and godmother Caroline trying to slide a chocolate form her forehead into her mouth. This is Reeve entertainment at its best!

This year however we managed to get through the festive days without too many awkward moments…My mum did a fantastic job to manage everything once again to perfection. For Christmas dinner we have turkey, ham, parsnips, stuffing, sausages, bacon and the always delicious Brussels sprouts.


Christmas day itself was spend preparing the house for our 14 guests, having Christmas lunch (champagne, salmon and …. Galician home-made chorizo: how posh!!) and of course opening presents! This year Papa Noel presented me ‘Chronicles’ a book by Bob Dylan, a photo album and some very nice socks (as you can see below!)

Pre-christmas days

I left Madrid on Wednesday the 20th of December and was rather lucky to catch my flight. Although Carmen and I took two hours (a lot!) to get to the airport we were surprised by an underground defect. With us about 300 travellers were stranded just two metro stops away from the airport which resulted in a Taxi-frenzy!

The Spanish are not well-known for their queuing, especially when they want to get to the airport in time! After 45 minutes waiting for a cab we eventually shared a taxi with two dodgy people and as we approached the airport I wasn’t sure if we would get the plane. With two minutes to go before the check-in closed we arrived at the airport, ran to the check-in and only just made it. Actually, the only reason why we made was through Carmen’s clear thinking.

On my arrival in London my brother Pieter (Pedro) was waiting as he is studying his Masters there. The following two days was spent doing final Christmas shopping with Piet. Although this was stressing it was nice to wonder around London again.


On Friday we went to High Easter and were joined by Pieter’s girlfriend Ernestine who joined in the fun. Also my sister’s husband-to-be Alex made it, so it was off to the Indian restaurant for a great curry-meal and a great way to start Christmas.

Deciembre

Amigos,

It has been a long time since I updated my blog. I apologize. The last weeks before Christmas went very fast with lots to do.

First things first, during El Puente (see previous post) Carmen and I visited the surroundings of Madrid by making trips to Toledo and El Escorial.

Toledo is a must-see but unfortunately I feel there are too many giris (tourists) wondering around. There are more souvenir shops than panerias (bakeries). Anyway, it is a good place to stock up Christmas presents and this is what we eventually did. The visit was made in company with Herman (pictured next to me in front of the famous Toledo cathedral) and his family who were visiting Madrid during the Puente. Other pictures include me with the Cruzcampo (beer) man and me inside the synagoge of Toledo.

The day we went to El Escorial was the two-year anniversary of me and Carmen. Some of you reading may remember the day we first met on the boat from Stockholm to Talinn, in the Aluminium bar on deck 7 – also known as the ‘fun deck’. The warm memories of that night were nowhere to be found in El Escorial – our chosen place of celebration. It was literarily freezing and – to make things worse – we had to wait one hour in a queue to get in!! But this didn’t spoil the festivities of the day as we could use our anniversary presents (a hat, scarf and thermos can) to the full extent!

El puente: Segovia!

Spain has something truly magnificent: el Puente. Puente translates to bridge and this is exactly what it means: a bridge between two days. This year the Puente lasted for three days as we celebrated two free days – separated by the Puente. This was followed by a weekend. In other words, we had five days off between the 6th and 10th of December.

Carmen and I had decided that we would visit Madrid’s neighbouring towns during these days in stead of making more exotic trips to for example Seville. Furthermore, we wanted to visit places with bridges as it would be a crime not to pay homage to these magnificent things that also bring free days down here in Spain.



Segovia was our first stop and I was expecting little. The weatherman (Paco) had told us that the Puente would be the first cold days of the year, but I wasn’t prepared for the big Freeze that was thrown at us! However, Segovia was great and certainly didn’t disappoint in the bridge department. Segovia houses the oldest standing and working aqueduct (ok, not exactly a bridge!) built in the 1st century during Roman occupation. It is a truly outstanding feat of civil engineering! As you can see it is also very good for jumping!

Further, Segovia has a nice Cathedral, an ancient city wall and a castle to go with it. We visited the complete town within three hours so we had some time to spare when Carlos – our Erasmus friend – came to meet us in the afternoon. We decided to go to one of the Royal palaces scattered around. La Granja is well worth a visit after opening hours as it boasts over some great garden landscapes. The gardens were covered with snow which reminded us all a bit of Sweden.

Glory Supporter

It's Friday! Those of you who read this blog regularly know what this means: it is China day! So it was off to the Chinese restaurant once again! By now the man knows us and I know the word for toilet in Chinese (thao che, or something similar..this is Chinese with a Spanish accent!)

Anyway, you might have noticed that I didn't place any pictures on the blog this week, and you might have been rather disappointed with this lack of artistic expression . I apologize. But it all has to do with my new passion in life: Atletico Madrid.

My good Erasmus friend Eduardo made himself very popular by offering me a free ticket for the match against Real Sociedad last Saturday. I had been waiting for this for four weeks. No, I had been waiting for this moment all my life. Estadio Vicente Calderon is literally a coins throw away (this is what you do to the opposition’s goalkeeper) from our flat the 'Pyramid' and the attraction towards this great football club is immense.

I have to admit to one thing though.

In my life I have been a passionate supporter of the following football clubs: Feyenoord (my best friend at school supported the club and so did I), Werder Bremen (beginning of the 90's a Kiwi played for this club and I was in my retro NZ period), Ajax (I thought Portuguese football player Dani was very attractive), Arsenal (I was a big fan of Dennis Bergkamp and Ian Wright - I even have a football shirt to prove this), Manchester United (my dad 'supports' the club because his colleague 'supports' the club, and so did I), ADO Den Haag (they were doing well in the first division so I supported them), Barcelona (needs no explanation), PSV (they were doing well in the league so I supported them), Celta de Vigo (this is the Galician club of Carmen's sister boyfriend - and good man - Alberto, I went to a match and passionately supported them) and most recently Tottenham Hotspurs (Martin Jol is coach)

But now I have finally found my new footballing love: El Atletí. After seeing the match I couldn’t think of anything else but Atletí. Fernando Torres is my new spiritual leader and the songs sung in the stadium have enlightened me forever. This is my club for life.

So big was my admiration that I decided to celebrate my new path in life with a few drinks accompanied by my fellow Atletí follower Eduardo. We were joined by some Real Madrid infidels but this didn’t change my mood. This night I had been reborn!

So what does this have to do with my camera? Happily we went through the night, taking the occasional picture and as we were heading to the end of the morning we entered the club Vendetta (rapidly replacing ‘the Trinity’ as my local pub/club!) where we kept on taking photographs until one girl dropped my Canon Ixus 65 on the dance floor! (I could have known this was going to happen!)

Luckily my camera was insured against this (how I really don’t know but I don’t have to pay any peseta’s) and I will get it back within a couple of weeks. So, until then you will have to do without pictures. Vamos Atletí!