holland visa approved
i guess the folks at the dutch consulate didnt discover my (nonexistent) ties to al qaeda. and theyve decided to approve my visa. im all set then, and i can't wait to get myself to holland for my 10-day visit in august. too excited in fact that ive been reading up on NL (netherlands or nay-der-land to be faithful to its pronunciation) attractions and culture. i must say i have great respect for those folks. very simple (which they got from their calvinist roots), liberal (and that goes beyond their marijuana & euthanasia legalization), open-minded (although they could be stubborn about their opinions sometimes), social (especially when there's booze), outgoing (i guess it helps that it is quite a beautiful country they have), friendly (at least thrice more than new yorkers, but then who isnt), frank (although too brutally honest at times, ok, all of the time), socially- and politically-aware (i get embarrassed at times even coz they know more than the philippines than i do).
what i appreciate/envy most about them is that they dont take life too seriously--something which is quite "natural" for a filipino like me. not all of those dutch kids fall under the pretty good category of course, as im sure there are exceptions. but in general, i guess they really are a good people. and they must be doing something right--they would not be number 1 happiest/most satisfied country, otherwise (but then again van gogh was dutch). should be a great 10-day party-hearty in august (i need a break! ha..). can't wait to see amsterdam, rotterdam, maastricht, zeeland, and maybe more. and more so, the people. got the only line i need ready, Een bier, alstublieft. but if they ask for it. i got Wat moet je! up my sleeves.
in somewhat related news, been able to see 3 good foreign films since the last post. well the world (china) was ok (despite very good reviews from people who really know what theyre saying). but memories of a murder (south korea) and march of penguins (france) i thought were really good. it was a great trio combo. the first quite surreal, the second a hilarious detective thriller, the third a national geographic feature film with heart (great happy family movie!).
now, in totally unrelated news, the jalapeno which i planted is starting to bear fruit (isnt a pepper a vegetable? oh wait, according to jeeves a pepper is a fruit, kindalike tomato). and the marigolds i started out from seeds continue to flower. problem is though that they stink quite a bit. oh well, at least now i know what wont be planted next year, assuming id still be based here in NY and that id still have a balcony for plants.
now im really pushing it. another unrelated bit. as i was walking this afternoon like a headless chicken with no destination in mind but with a camera in hand, i saw this "graffiti" art/advertisement somewhere in NOHO (that's shortcut for NOrth of HOuston, which in newyawker speak is pronounced as HOUSE-ton). i thought id share it coz it's pretty good actually. another instance of the growing trend of advertising meets design. i wonder when i'll be able to quit churning shitty work and start doing one of those. maybe if i stopped online window shopping, web surfing and blog checking at work i would.
posted by jason pacheco @ 21:36
6 comments
6 Comments:
cool blog. how do you get your words to wrap around your pics? I figured out how to implement video clips...but when it gets into the fancy pancy make my own design stuff, it just gets overwhelming. Anna
thanks, yomismo and anna.
anna, i use flickr.com to place photos into my blog (that's the macbased photo hosting i think. if youre pc based im sure there are a whole lot others). in flickr, you can select how photos are imported into the entry. the option of having the text to wrap around is there. flickr automatically puts in the html code so you dont need to do anything. plus, if you're into html, you'd even be able to modify that in blogger. if not, no worries. flickr (or whatever photo hosting service i assume) should be able to take care of it.
if it doesnt work, just let me know. ill forward the code which you can cut and paste (and modify) to your blog entries.
oh hello roel (pronounced as rule, i assume. a good friend of mine whom ill be visiting is "coen" so i sort of know about the "oe" sound).
yup, believe it or not, your country's number one happiest according to a survey featured in time magazine early this year (i wonder what that makes of the rest of the world, then). oh, i do know that you folks complain a lot (coen used to complain about how new york subway trains took ages all of the time). and i sort of know that the coffeeshops (and red light district) are more of a tourist's thing really. read in the travel guide even that only 5% of your population actually uses drugs--much less than in france (where they have stricter drug rules)... anyway, thanks for the greeting. if you happen to bump into this lost tourist some time between august 6-15 who all of a sudden says, lekker wertje?, you'd know it's me then! ha..
are you from the south or the north, by the way? not that it matters of course. or that i favor people from up there or down there in any way... ha...
so it was temporary after all :P
now i've forgotten what i wanted to say tho. 'cept nga that you still haven't told us what that chinese woman did to deserve such violent thoughts against her.
oh and both holland and sept 21 sound lovely.
utrecht ka?? u can pay joma sison a visit..hehe..just a thought ;)
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