February

Hi all,   

My blogposts will be a bit different from now on, but I think you already noticed the change.

After 6 months of writing in Dutch I thought let’s write in English. The reason of this is because:

• I made non Dutch speaking friends and they would like to read my blogposts too.
• I want to improve my English because my goal is to speak and write in English perfectly after these 10 months.

Today it’s the 4^th of March that means that exactly 6 months ago I said ‘’goodbye’’ to my life in Holland and I said ‘’Hello’’ to an Au Pair life in London. If someone would have asked me 3 years ago if I wanted to live for 10 months somewhere else in a strange city, with a strange family I would definitely have said no. I always thought that I wouldn’t be able to live away from home. So I’m proud of myself that I’m still here and living this great Au Pair life!

In this new blogpost you will read about chickens in a henhouse, my 20^th birthday celebrations, beautiful lanterns etc. Make a cup of tea and have a seat because it will take some time to read.

For my new readers just a short summary about my life in London:

I live in the South-East of London in a town called Anerley. I take care of 2 girls named: Isla (7 years old) and Erin (4 years old) and I’m having a great time with them. The parents are called: Seema and Graham.

On the 2^nd of February there was a builder in the house to paint the walls. He was constantly chatting while I was doing laundry and stuff like that. At one point he asked me how old I was and I said that I was nearly 20 years old. His answer was: ‘’Oh I thought you were younger because you have a baby face.’’  In Dutch I would say: En bedankt… I know that I always look younger than I am but a ‘baby face’ say whattttt? The point was I was wearing make-up to. It wasn’t a compliment at all hahah.

A day later I played ‘schools’ with Erin. We pretended that she was the teacher and I was the child. A few hours later I went to the hairdresser because I wanted to cut my hair a bit shorter. I was very happy with the end result.

I went with Alexandra (German Au Pair) to the National Gallery. This is a museum with many paintings. We took a free guided tour. Our guide talked 1 hour about 5 paintings so we were looking for 12 minutes at 1 painting. So, so boring. Next we walked for a bit because the weather was beautiful.

Then we went to Westminster Abbey. Alexandra told me that when there’s a service you can go inside for free. We went inside a few minutes before the service began otherwise we had to pay 20 pounds. The service took 1 hour and I saw many similarities between a service in England and Holland.

The day after I met Marielle (German Au Pair) for the first time. We met each other at Kensington station and we had lunch. After that we went to the Victoria and Albert museum. This museum consists of paintings, old cutlery, vases etc. Again I came to the conclusion that I’m definitely not a museum person.

I celebrated my 20^th birthday on the 7^th of February. It was special to celebrate my birthday in London. In the morning I came downstairs and I got some cuddles of the girls.

Around 9 O’ clock I took the bus and train to the centre because my dad travelled to London that day to visit me. We spend our day together. Firstly we walked around Piccadilly Circus and at 1 O’clock we had a traditional afternoon tea in a fancy hotel. This was my birthday present from my host family. It was delicious with scones and jam, sandwiches, cupcakes and tea of course.

 

After our bellies were filled up we went to the London Eye. We had a beautiful view over the city. At 5 pm. I said goodbye to my dad and I went home. It was special to celebrate my birthday with him.

Isla wrote this little piece:

‘’In the evening we all went to Ask Italian in Beckenham. Ask Italian is a very good restaurant! The birthday girl had a pizza calzone with goats cheeseJ. For pudding we all had chocolate pizzaJ! It was made of normal pizza dough, Nutella, marshmallows and strawberries. IT WAS DELICOUS!’’ 🙂 🙂 🙂

Presents from my parents and sister

It was a great day that I will never forget!

The next day I volunteered to help with a school trip to the Science museum in the centre of London. I had one group of 4 children to look after. I had Isla in my group and 3 other girls.

We went with 2 classes so there were 61 children in total. And with these children plus the mothers and carers we travelled with public transport. I hear you thinking OMG public transport and 61 children helpppp! That’s what I thought too when I first heard it. Isla’s  teacher was really strict and has such a loud voice but she is friendly too so she has a good balance. I think that teachers are different in teaching than teachers in Holland because they focus a lot at being polite. For example the children say things like: ‘’Yes Miss Bodington’’, ‘’Thank you Miss Bodington’’. Whilst children in Holland just say: ‘’Okay’’ or ‘’yes/no’’.

We took the tram, train and bus. The bus was a long story because we took one bus and all the children were squashed in one little bus. Because it wasn’t a double decker but a single bus. We were at this bus for 20 minutes and people who were waiting at different bus stops couldn’t get in anymore.  After 2 hours we arrived at the museum. Then it was lunch time and after 2 hours it was time to go home again. I wasn’t really looking forward to travel back to the school. In the evening I was exhausted but it was a nice experience.

On Friday the 10^th of February my friends came to visited me and to explore the city. I waited for them at the arrival hall at St. Pancras. While they were walking through the doors they sung:  (These are 2 sentences of a typical Dutch birthday song but they changed the lyrics).

‘’2 violen en trommel en een fluit,

Leintje die is jarig en onze koffers puilen uit’’.

After that we went to our hostel. Our room was so small so it was very busy with 6 girls in one room. We always call ourselves a ‘’kippenhok’’ this means a henhouse. We are always chatting and with so many girls it gets loud. Because of the bunkbeds and the small room we looked like chickens in a henhouse. You can’t say that it wasn’t cosy, can you? 😉

Around 3 O’ clock I showed them the Big Ben, London Eye etc. In the evening we ate at my favourite Italian restaurant Bella Italia.

 

 

Peekaboo I see you…

Mean Girls 3.0

On Saturday we went to Piccadilly circus, Soho and China town.  I booked a table at a burger restaurant because it would be impossible to find a table for 6 people. Because of the booking we had to hurry to go to the restaurant. In the evening we went to a bar called: ‘’Strawberry Moons’’. We had a few drinks and danced it was a great evening and around 2.30pm. we went to bed in our henhouse.

On Sunday we went to my favourite part of London. Have a little guess?

OXFORDSTREET

My friends bought a few items and they went back home at 6 pm. It was hard to say goodbye but after 5 minutes I dried my tears and went home.

The next day Isla was at home because of half term (holiday). Isla wrote:

On Monday we made some chocolate chip cupcakes which were so good J. I did most of the work, Annelein did the harder parts for meJ. Baking is so much fun (I should be on junior bake of (just joking ,I’m too young)).

On the 15^th of February Isla and I went to the movie Trolls. It was fun because they used famous songs so it was interesting for the parents/carers too. After that we went to the library and she made a 3D model of an airplane for her homework. Then we decorated an old shoe box for the storage of all my memories of my time here in London.

I met a new German Au Pair called Lara and with her and her friends I went to the Modern Tate museum. This week was London Fashion Week and in one section of the museum was a show space for a couple of fashion shows. We didn’t know this so on our way to the museum we saw a lot people wearing fancy and fashionable clothes. So we walked to the crowd and saw the visitors with their beautiful but sometimes weird combination of clothes. After 45 minutes we decided to go to the museum. I thought that this museum was the most interesting museum up to now.

 

 

 

When I was at home that evening I saw in my 5 year journal that exactly 1 year ago I went to an information meeting of my Dutch Au Pair agency. It was so funny to read this and I’m still so happy that I started this adventure.

On the 24^th I went with Alexandra to the Magic Lantern Festival in a town called Chiswick. We walked for 75 minutes in a decorated garden full of impressive handmade lanterns.

On our way back home we compared the differences between German and Dutch language, this was very funny because there are a lot similarities. After a while our brains were confused and we couldn’t speak properly English/Dutch/German anymore.

I went to London Fashion Week Festival on the 26^th.

We saw a real fashion show of a designers couple called: ‘Teatum Jones’. After that Marielle and I made pictures in different photo boots,  I had a manicure, we tried on coats that we couldn’t afford etc. It was an amazing day!

 

Some random pictures:

 

Good job you are nearly at the end of my blog but first I have exciting news because next week I will move with my family from the South-East to the North of London. They sold their house so from next week I will live in a town called: Southgate. I’m really looking forward to the move because I like the challenge and I can explore another part of London.

Thank you for reading my blog!

Lots of love from London,

Annelein